Judgment Matthew 7:1-6

Sermon

Key Passage

Matthew 7:1–6 NIV

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye. “Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces.

Vision/Mission

We exist to reach the world for Jesus, one person at a time

We do this by creating Biblical disciples in relational environments.

Relationship was always God’s plan

From the garden of Eden

“It is not good for man to be alone”

To the 10 Commandments

Love God

Love others

Fruit of the Spirit

Love, joy peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, self-control

God’s design has never been in a vacuum of just “Me and Jesus”.

God’s design has always been:

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength

AND

Love your neighbor as yourself.

Over the last two weeks, we spoke about our treasure, and connected to our treasure is the gaze of our hearts.

What we value and focus on is what we will worry about

If we are surrendered to God, we trust Him

This is a very “Love the Lord your God” topic.

In our passage today, Jesus transitions this discussion to how we deal with other people.

It is a passage about judgment, righteousness, and relationship.

We must define a disciple in order to wrap our heads around what we are talking about today.

Matthew 4:19 ESV

And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”

A disciple is:

Following Jesus

Being changed by Jesus

Obedient to the mission of Jesus to make disciples

If I’m following Jesus, and I’m being changed by Jesus...and I hope this is happening for all of us.

I want you to know this. It doesn’t matter at all without relationship with others.

In fact, if you are being changed in your heart, but you continue to be divisive, hateful, unforgiving, and argumentative, you cannot fulfill what God’s will is for your life.

Completing God’s will in this life will always involve relationship and growth in God to be seen in the lives around us.

Which is where I want to begin as we talk about being judgey.

Sermon

I want to do a little exercise about judgment:

If we were to elect a new world leader this year and these were the candidates:

Associates with crooked politicians

Consults his astrologist

Drinks 8-10 martini’s/day

Chain smokes

Has had two mistresses

Kicked out of office twice

used opium in college

sleeps in until noon

drinks a quart of whiskey every night

Decorated war hero

doesn’t smoke

vegetarian

drinks an occasional beer

never cheated on his wife

Franklin D Roosevelt

Winston Churchill

Adolf Hitler

The point of this exercise is to show us that we really need to be careful with the topic of judgment.

It is likely something that we won’t see in ourselves, but we readily see it in others.

Our passage today 6 verses today bring with it two of the most misused passages of Scripture, so I hope that we can bring some clarity and understanding to them.

The first one is our first verse for today.

Matthew 7:1–2 NIV

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

Have you heard this one?

I think this is probably one of the most well known verses in the Bible. Even better than John 3:16. Really, I’ve heard it a ton.

We will take some time to interpret this passage.

As we do, I want you to know that it will shed a light on the rest of the passage for us.

Even the confusing “Pearls before the swine” passage.

There are two tensions that we have as we approach this passage.

First, to take this in absolute literal sense, which will lead us to a place of life where we do not make any decisions for any reason ever. Because to do so would be to judge one thing as better than another for our lives.

I don’t believe this is what this passage is saying.

Second, would be to explain this passage away, giving us license to judge everything around us in spite of these words.

I also do not believer this is what this passage is calling for.

When we come across a passage like this, we need to put some interpretive skills into the game so we can know what the Bible is saying.

We talked about context a few weeks ago.

One way to understand what a verse is talking about is to look at what the verses around it are talking about.

We will look at another interpretive practice today.

The Bible talks in other places about appropriate and inappropriate judgment.

The Bible will not contradict itself.

Also, we cannot build an entire theology on one verse

If it is worth us knowing about it, God will talk about it thematically throughout the Scriptures.

We will put both of these skills to use in our interpretation of our passage today, and I believe they both point us in the same direction.

As we look at this passage, I want to ask a few questions, so we have some clear understanding.

First, is this a passage that gives direction regarding our relationship with God, or our relationship with others.

This is a passage that has to do with our relationship with others.

Second, is this a passage that gives us a rule or law to follow? Or is it an instruction that we need to interpret in our hearts?

I want to remind you of all of the law that Jesus has already spoken.

He has demonstrated that the issue of the heart is much deeper and much more comprehensive than the issue of our outward actions.

And as it deals with our interactions with one another, if we address our heart, then the action will be the fruit of that tree.

Another way of saying this is: Does Jesus intend for us to simply say non-judgmental sounding words to one another, but to remain judgmental toward others in our hearts?

No. It is an issue of our hearts that Jesus is dealing with.

Out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks.

So let’s break this passage down:

What is the context before this?

All the way back into chapter 5, we see Jesus saying, “You have heard it said..., but I say”

He is contrasting what they had been taught by the religious leaders at that time with what it looks like to follow Jesus and have our hearts changed by Jesus

Jesus said, “I did not come to abolish the law, rather I came to fulfill the law”

Jesus is the perfection of the law. We are perfect in the law if we are in Christ

So rather than being a slave to the law, we become slaves to Jesus.

We devote our heart to Him to change us into His purpose and will.

As we moved into chapter 6, we see all of the good deeds and again there is a contrast of hearts

Don’t pray for everyone to see you. Don’t give so everyone sees. Don’t fast so everyone knows.

These are our personal pursuits of God.

Again, Jesus used the religious leaders as a model of what not to do.

It isn’t that Jesus was condemning the structure of leadership. This was established by God.

Jesus was revealing the heart of the people who were in those roles.

It isn’t about the title, it’s about the heart.

The entire sermon on the mount has to do with pursuing our relationship with God and others with a transformed heart.

Because of this, we can look at this and Jesus’ instruction about judging others is going to deal with a matter of our hearts that will result in a change of our actions. Not a law that we need to learn how to follow.

As we look at the broad text of the Scriptures, we can find a number of places where judgment seems to be ENCOURAGED by God.

In a few verses, we will see in Matthew 7 that Jesus says, “Beware of false prophets”

How would we know they are a false prophet, unless we judge their words and actions to some extent?

Later in that same section, Jesus says, “You will know a tree by its fruit”

Again, it is a judgment call to look at the fruit of a tree to see whether it is good or not.

Outside of that, there is the passage later in Matthew that talks about church discipline

If a brother is in sin...do these things.

There has to be some judgment of the circumstance that would determine that this person is in sin.

There is even a book of the Bible called Judges where God raised up people called Judges to accomplish His purposes of leadership within the nation.

I think we can see that this is a warning against a heart that is contrary to what God would desire from us, not a law prohibiting all forms of judgment.

As I have read and dug into this topic, I believe there are three types of judgment that God repeatedly speaks against.

As well as numerous others that are actually encouraged by God.

Wrong types of judgment:

Condemnation

Blame

Salvation

We’ll actually talk about these more as we dissect today’s passage

Condemnation- For us to condemn is contrary to the heart of Jesus

John 3:16–17 NIV

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.

Jesus came to save people, not condemn them.

Yes, they are sinful, but their sin condemns them, we don’t have to. We have the message of hope. Condemnation is already on them.

Blame

Blame is judging the guilt of another person for my circumstances.

We declare others guilty and ourselves to be innocent victims.

When we blame, we cannot forgive. When we blame, we cannot be the relational people God called us to be. Because the judgment of blame is between us.

Salvation

There is one eternal judge of salvation. It is not for me to determine who is saved and who is not saved.

As we have already said, there will be fruit on the tree, but people are not saved or unsaved by my declaration.

Salvation is in the hands of God, not me.

Good forms of judgment (with the right heart):

Building one another up in holiness

Discernment of truth

Discretion in wisdom

Building one another up in holiness

We will talk about this in a few minutes, but one role of the church is to confess our sin and help one another grow in maturity and sanctification.

We need each other to grow in holiness. Sometimes that means a hard conversation about sin in that person’s life. But it isn’t for condemnation. It is for sanctification

Discernment of truth

Many false prophets have gone out into the world

As we hear people preach and speak messages, we must judge their words, actions, and motives.

This is not in condemnation, it is for the protection of our souls and for the protection of the church.

Discretion in wisdom

We will talk about the pearls before swine verse in a minute.

There are times and places where we need to determine the quality of a person before allowing them to share in what has value.

This is true in our world for children’s ministry

Every one of our children’s ministry people are background checked. Is this because we are judging everyone?

Yes! I think there is a discretion in getting information on people and determining if they are safe to be with our kids.

This isn’t wrong, this is wisdom.

So with that being said, we have built a foundation for our text today. I think the point we have established will bring with them some clarity as we now dive into God’s Word.

Love must replace condemnation

God’s Plan for Relationship:

Love must replace condemnation

Matthew 7:1–2 NIV

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

Now that we understand that Jesus is not saying that we should never judge anything, we can look at the rest of Scripture and understand that Jesus is saying that if we have a critical and unbiblical judgmental heart, then the fruit that comes off of that tree will not be simply directed to those who we are judging.

That judgment will be rendered to us as well.

This points us back to the justice of God.

When we covered a passage a few weeks ago about, “If you don’t forgive, your Father in Heaven will not forgive you. But if you do forgive, your Father in Heaven will forgive you.”

Does this not sound like a very similar instruction?

This isn’t a suggestion. This isn’t a recommendation.

Our hearts toward one another must be changed by Jesus.

That change must be lived out.

If we are called to be a light in this dark world, it will be done by those who do not condemn like the world condemns. Rather, it is by those who love like Jesus loves.

I believe this directs us to a place of understanding how important relationship between people is in the eyes of God.

If we act in a holy way to others, God is pleased with this

If we act in unholy ways toward others, God is not pleased

Because God wants us to understand who He is and live that knowledge out in the world around us

If we follow Jesus, we will be changed by Jesus.

Changed in ways that align our hearts with the heart of Jesus involving the lost as well as the church.

Accountability must replace blame

God’s Plan for Relationship:

Love must replace condemnation

Accountability must replace blame

Matthew 7:3–5 NIV

“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.

I needed to change the way that I viewed this verse.

I have always viewed this verse as one that gives us the law “Don’t judge”.

But I want us to see a couple of things here.

First of all, these are brothers.

Not likely intended to be literal brothers, but two people in the same family of God.

I want to read the last line of this passage. What is the goal in relationship?

“Then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.

If junk in our eyes prevents us from seeing correctly, and God wants us to see correctly, we both need to get the junk out of our eyes.

If there is junk in our eyes, we cannot see God clearly, and we cannot see each other clearly.

In fact, we cannot see anything clearly.

I want you to think about this in the issue of conflict between two people.

I had Harold join us in our sermon prep time and we beat him up pretty good, using him for all sorts of silly examples of these principles.

So let’s say that Harold and I have a conflict with each other.

Harold is having a birthday party and I didn’t to bake the cupcakes, and now Harold doesn’t have any cupcakes for his birthday party.

Harold could blame me and start to tell me everything that is wrong in my life.

How irresponsible I am. How he can never trust me. How I don’t manage my time well. The list can go on and on.

How hard does Harold have to work to get me to fix my issues?

He’d have to work pretty hard.

Now, let’s say that I buy a calendar, and organize my life, does that mean Harold and I are good now? No.

Here is an example of how the plank and speck thing works.

Harold sees an issue in my life. I see an issue in my life.

But Harold is now angry and unforgiving.

Can Harold help me with my issue if he is angry and unforgiving?

No, it will only continue to develop into more conflict, blame and division.

It may even lead to us no longer being friends.

Harold may not even know why the cupcakes weren’t made.

Maybe I was lazy and watched too much TV.

Or maybe I was busy taking care of my family because they were sick.

If we have a judgmental prideful heart, which option will I choose.

That prideful heart will fill in all of the gaps of information that I need to know and render a judgment on the other person.

And those gaps will never be filled with righteous things. It will always be filled in a way to justify my judgment of the other person.

This is a silly example, but until we can take personal accountability for our own sin, we will never be able to help one another.

The Biblical guidance is very clear for us as a church. Our relational humility will lead us to Biblical righteousness.

Our relational pride will lead us to brokenness and judgment.

I want to move to a section of Scripture in Galatians.

Galatians 6:1 NIV

Brothers and sisters, if someone is caught in a sin, you who live by the Spirit should restore that person gently. But watch yourselves, or you also may be tempted.

If someone is caught in a sin.

Is there some judgment calls made here?

Absolutely. Is it in condemnation? Or is it in building one another up in holiness?

We should restore the person gently.

If not, we may be tempted to sin in our restoration.

That passage ends this way.

Galatians 6:7–10 NIV

Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction; whoever sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.

A man reaps what he sows.

Is that not what Jesus said?

The measure that you judge others, you will be judged?

If we sow judgment, we will reap judgment.

If we sow in the flesh, we will reap destruction

Who has lived a life of toxic judgment and lived to say that their life is relationally healthy?

It doesn’t work that way. They reap destruction in their relationships.

This passage concludes with this thought:

Let us do good to all people.

Relational instruction

Especially, those who belong to the family of believers

This sounds remarkably similar to our passage today.

Our need to remove the plank from our own eye before helping others with theirs.

We must address our heart, before we address others.

This leads us to our last verse for today.

It is also one of the most misquoted and misunderstood passages in the Bible.

Judge not, leaves us with a cultural mentality of self-justification without sanctification.

This verse about pearls and swine is often misused as well.

I’ll explain:

Discipleship must replace imposing holiness

God’s Plan for Relationship:

Love must replace condemnation

Accountability must replace blame

Discipleship must replace imposing holiness

At face value, we may not see this as a discipleship verse, so let me walk us through this passage.

How I have most often heard this passage used is that we shouldn’t share the Gospel with obnoxious people.

If they are rude, argumentative, and unreceptive, then we won’t speak the truth about Jesus to them because they won’t value it.

There may be some wisdom to this. We don’t go out seeking to argue people into the faith or throwing our seed intentionally in places where it won’t take root.

However, what have we read that would lead you to the conclusion that this single verse is about the gospel?

Nothing.

What is our context?

It is a passage about humility in our relationships, not prideful arrogance that condemns or blames others.

So if we are to break this down, we need to ask the question, “Who are the pigs?” and “What are the pearls?”

As we have read, I would argue that the pigs are those who have unchanged, unrepentant hearts that hold to the law and do not have a changed heart like Jesus demands.

In this case, one example was the Pharisees, who were likely present at this time of Jesus’ sermon.

They had imposed all of the rules, but their hearts were far from clean. They judged the people and in their pride, saw themselves as holy.

Like a pig that bathes by rolling around in the mud.

Or a dog who rolls around in other things that make them nasty.

Dogs weren’t pets in this culture. They were considered dirty and unpleasant. To call someone a dog was an insult to their character.

What are the pearls or holy things?

I believe it is exactly what Jesus is teaching. He is teaching about humility, compassion, giving, praying, fasting, giving the benefit of the doubt, and love.

If these truths of great value were entrusted to the pigs and dogs, would they change their hearts?

No, they would abuse them and force them upon people as laws. Not as God would.

This is where we must replace imposing holiness with discipleship.

Jesus isn’t asking us to walk around to people and “for their good” tell them the things they need to do.

Jesus is asking us to be in relationship with one another and walk out our lives of sanctification.

This is consistent with the rest of Scripture

On the flip side, if a person is in unrepentant sin, no amount of the truth shared with them will restore them.

Their heart is not going to change.

There is a ton of other scripture to support this interpretation:

Matthew 18:17 NIV

If they still refuse to listen, tell it to the church; and if they refuse to listen even to the church, treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector.

2 Thessalonians 3:14–15 NIV

Take special note of anyone who does not obey our instruction in this letter. Do not associate with them, in order that they may feel ashamed. Yet do not regard them as an enemy, but warn them as you would a fellow believer.

Titus 3:10–11 NIV

Warn a divisive person once, and then warn them a second time. After that, have nothing to do with them. You may be sure that such people are warped and sinful; they are self-condemned.

These passages all have to do with those who are in the church.

We cannot impose holiness upon a stubborn heart.

We must live out relationally with them with both parties in humility.

Summary

I want to take a moment and summarize the point of this sermon today.

God’s design for His people has always been relational. Loving Him fully is inseparable from loving others well.

Judgment reveals the condition of our heart. When our heart is full of pride, we condemn, blame, or even try to control others. When our heart is transformed by Christ, we walk in love, accountability, and discipleship.

Love must replace condemnation. We are not the eternal judge—God is. Our calling is to reflect His mercy.

Accountability must replace blame. Before pointing out the faults of others, we must first examine and deal with our own sin. Only then can we gently help others.

Discipleship must replace imposing holiness. True transformation happens in relationship, not by forcing rules. Jesus calls us to walk with people, not just correct them.

Only by allowing our hearts to be changed by Jesus can we live a life with others that demonstrates His love. It is a light in this world.

Conclusion

Ephesians 4:29 NIV

Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.

Ephesians 4:31 NIV

Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice.

Real Life in Action:

Head- What fruit do I display?

Heart- Do I see the speck in others eyes more than I see the log in my own?

Hands- What relationship needs to be restored?

Head- Condemnation, blame or building up others, using discernment, giving the benefit of the doubt, listening to the whole story?

Heart- This will reveal our hearts, whether we like it or not. Do you see the sin of others more than the sin of yourself? Does this sin of others carry a heavier penalty than your own sin? You might have a log in your eye and you don’t even see it.

Hands- What relationship impacted by my judgment needs to be restored by my humility and accountability? It will likely require you to acknowledge to the other person that you have held judgment in your heart, and they need to see your love.

Gospel Presentation