Eyes Wide Open

Today, we’re going to take a field trip of sorts. I want us to go into a courtroom where we will find the traditional setup. There will be a judge, jury, lawyers, witnesses, the court reporter, a witness stand, and the public. If you’ve ever watched Law and Order, I bet you can just envision the kind of courtroom I am describing. Some people may be very familiar with the scene, others may be naive to it. As we enter this courtroom we can feel the tension. The defendant sits nervously next to his attorney, awaiting the results of his hearing.

The weight of condemnation weighs heavy in the air. He knows that his life will be forever changed because of his irresponsible decision to drink and drive. A person is dead as a result of his night of recklessness. The debilitating guilt persists no matter how many times he apologizes or asks for forgiveness. The witnesses have shared their stories, the first responders laid out the gruesome details of the wreck. And the family members of the deceased wept through their statements.

All that is left is for the jury to come back and announce their verdict, and for the judge to deliver the punishment that will fit the crime.

What thoughts are going through your mind right now? How would you respond to this scenario if you were sitting on the jury? It wouldn’t take long for a group of people to decide that the defendant was guilty and deserved the greatest punishment possible.

Our sense of justice takes over in this situation. It’s straight forward. Justice must prevail. And I believe justice is very important.

1. We must be very careful that justice doesn’t turn into condemnation.

It’s all a matter of the heart.

In Matthew 7:1-2, Jesus says, “Do not judge, or you too will be judged. 2 For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”

Jesus used the word “judge” here because it carries the connotation of condemnation. Jesus is getting to the heart of the matter. He is telling us that we should not condemn others, even if they are guilty. Condemnation is a loaded word. It means to express extreme disapproval not just of an action but of the person as a whole. Extreme disapproval can lead to behavior modification, but it will never lead to heart transformation. And if we’ve learned anything from the Sermon on the Mount, it’s that Jesus is all about heart transformation.

Some people get confused with the biblical concept of judgement because it seems like the Word of God contradicts itself.. In Matthew 18:15 Jesus says, “If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over.

We can judge easily between right and wrong, most people are born with this ability. But there’s a big difference between pointing out a fault or a sin and condemning the whole person. The segment from the Sermon on the Mount is “concerned with the fault-finding, condemnatory attitude which is too often combined with a blindness to one’s own failings.” You see, how we go about correction matters. We can either come from a place of love or we can come from a place of judgement and condemnation.

2. It all depends on how much we’re willing to humbly admit our own faults and flaws.

According to Romans 3:23, we have all sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Not one of us, in and of ourselves, can stand pure and blameless before God. We have all been led astray and have sinned against others and against God. But so many times we pretend like we’ve never done anything that deserves severe punishment. We act like our sins aren’t as grievous as others’. Sometimes it’s because our sins haven’t personally affected as many lives as others’, or maybe it’s because we just haven’t been caught.

Jesus challenges us on this when He goes on to say, “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? 4 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?”

All too often we switch those two things around. We think we just have sawdust in our eyes, while everyone else is walking around with a log sticking out of theirs.

If we head back to the courtroom, where the jury is about to announce their verdict, we can start to unravel our severe condemnation for just a minute. Think back to a time when you have had one too many drinks. Maybe you were tipsy or maybe you were full blown drunk. Maybe you drove yourself home that night, and by the grace of God, you weren’t in an accident. Maybe you were about to drive yourself home and someone grabbed your keys and made you stay the night. Or maybe God provided a DD for you that night so you didn’t have to worry about causing an accident. You got drunk. You committed the same sin as the young man sitting before you, you just didn’t get caught. You didn’t have to be held accountable for your actions.

Maybe drinking isn’t your vice. Maybe you’ve struggled with promiscuity. You have gone from partner to partner to get the love your heart desires. You haven’t been “caught” yet. You haven’t had to deal with the consequences of your reckless behavior. You haven’t experienced an unplanned pregnancy, but you could’ve. You could’ve been faced with the choice to have a child while you were a child yourself. But instead of remembering the sins of our past, we quickly condemn others for the same sin they’re living in now.

How do we so quickly forget that it could have been us sitting in the defendants seat? It could be us facing charges that could radically change our lives. It could be us being condemned to life in prison. But for some reason we weren’t caught. We haven’t had to walk in another person’s shoes. We weren’t condemned to live with the harsh consequences of our sin.

So how do we keep from having a judgmental and condemning heart?

Recognize that we have a log in our own eye. That we sin and that our sin deserves the same punishment. Romans 6:23 says, “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

We remember that Jesus took our sin upon Himself so that we could have eternal life. The One who was sinless bore our sin, He paid our debt, so we could be free. And what did He set us free from? The condemnation we deserved. He set us free from the shame and guilt we were being crushed by. He not only set us free from our sin, He set us free for something. He set us free for the glory of His Name. He set us free so we could be people who could love the sinners of this world into a relationship with Him. And the reason we can love those who are steeped in sin is because we know just how much we’ve been saved from.

We praise God for the forgiveness we have received in Jesus Christ. We praise Him for saving us from ourselves. For not giving us what we deserve. And for sparing us from the potential consequences our sin deserves.

Most of us are familiar with John 3:16. 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. But most of us have never commited the following verse to memory because it isn’t as “feel good.” The next verse goes on to say, “For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.”

Here’s how this ties in with our Sermon on the Mount passage, the word that Jesus used for “judge” in our Matthew passage, is the same word that John uses for condemn in this passage. Krino.

God has every right to condemn us for our sin but He doesn’t. Instead He loves us and offers us salvation. And that is not just for us to enjoy. It is His desire that all people would receive His forgiveness, love and freedom. All people. Those who’s sins have been minimal in the world’s view, and those who’s sins have destroyed multitudes of people.

Jesus continues by saying, “5 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.”

Living with a log in our eye means that we humbly look at people’s lives and recognize that we are no better than they are. We are reminded of our own sins so we don’t condemn people who desperately need Jesus’ love and salvation.

One of the greatest reasons people do not want to come to church is they are afraid that they will be judged. They recognize the hypocrisy and they want nothing to do with it. So as a church family, we need to continually remind ourselves that it is only by the grace of God that we have been saved. We take the first step and allow God to correct us, prune us, take the log out of our own eye.

3. When we partner with God to remove the logs from our eyes we will end up with the ability to see clearly.

The word for clearly in this passage means “eyes wide open.” What a beautiful metaphor for what happens when we live as fully forgiven people. Our eyes are clear and wide open to see people for who God created them to be. We don’t focus on their sin and correcting their behavior, we focus on them as a beloved child of God. And as we love them God will give us the words to speak to lovingly correct them. But it must first come from Holy Spirit conviction before it comes from us.

So,lets return to the courtroom. The defendant rises from his seat to receive the punishment he deserves. Justice needs to prevail. He is found guilty and receives his sentence. But then something happens. The family of the deceased approaches the bench and they offer him forgiveness. Heartfelt forgiveness. They know that this man’s life will never be the same. That he never intended to hurt someone. And after they did some soul searching themselves, they realized that forgiveness was the only option.

Just because we’re forgiven doesn’t mean that we won’t have consequences to our sin. But we must let God dole out those consequences as He sees fit. He knows what each person needs to come to the point where they find Him. He knows what will cause them to turn to Him.

There will always be the temptation to judge others. But when we begin to live humbly, loving those the world has considered condemned, people will not understand. The world is constantly wanting us to cast judgement upon others. Whether it’s athletes, political figures, celebrities, or family and friends, there will always be a draw to join in the judgement. But we won’t do it, because we want to be people who extend the love and grace of God. And we will be ridiculed because of it. People will judge us for loving the unlovable. So Jesus wraps up this portion of the Sermon on the Mount by saying, “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.”

I just started reading the story of Amy Carmichael, who was a missionary to India. She remembers the day she heard God speak to her for the first time. She was a young teenager, and one day when she and her family were walking home from church they came upon an old beggar who was carrying a heavy stack of sticks. She and two other siblings decided to help the woman get to her destination. her brother carried the sack of sticks and her other brother and her tool the old woman by the arms and helped carry her to the alley she was headed for. As they slowly walked along the streets of Ireland, Amy felt ashamed to be associating with the old beggar. Then her attention was drawn to a fountain. “Amy studied it closely. It was made of blocks of cut stone, and the water sprayed out from three spouts at its center. As she studied it, Amy suddenly stopped. Someone was talking to her. She clearly heard a voice say, “Gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw…the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the world which any man has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward.” Amy turned to see who was speaking. There was no one there. But she had heard a voice, plain and clear. Puzzled, she walked on with the old woman on her arm. As she did, something felt very different inside. Amy was no longer embarrassed. In fact, she walked with her head held high for all to see. The trio escorted the old woman to where she wanted to go and then ran to catch up with their mother and the other children to finish the walk home. Amy had known for as long as she could remember that God loved her, but she began to wonder about how knowing He loved her changed the way she acted each day.”

Others will judge us for living Kingdom lives. When everyone is jumping on the condemnation bandwagon, with pitchforks in hand, our acts of grace and love will be misunderstood and judged. People will call us weak, they’ll take jabs at us. They won’t understand the beauty of forgiveness, but it won’t cause us to stop living the way Jesus lived.

Jesus could have condemned the tax collector, the adulteress, the leper, the demon possessed, the soldier, the doubter, and the thief. But He didn’t. Instead He looked at them with eyes wide open, He saw them as a whole person, a person created in the image of God, and instead of condemning them He freed them. He drew near to them. He called them to follow Him. He cast out the demons and restored dignity. He healed and redeemed. He gave eternal life to the undeserving. And after dispersing an enraged crowd, He said to a woman condemned to die, “where are they? Has no one condemned you?” 11 “No one, sir,” she said. Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”

That is the beauty of living in the Kingdom. We have a King who loves us and doesn’t condemn us. He is perfectly just and merciful. He knows we’re all in process and He is patient with us. Now it’s our turn to bring the Kingdom to earth by loving people instead of condemning them.