Where is Your Focus?

Introduction

As human beings we all make judgments. This morning you made a judgment whenever you got up and looked at your phone to decide what to wear. Some of you got in your car to drive here this morning and you immediately made a judgment as you left your house and turned onto a street or drove through an intersection. You had to decide if you had enough time to turn without causing an accident or if you had enough time to pass through the intersection before the light turned red. We make judgment each and every day and many of these judgments are good - if you didn’t make any judgments then that would be a very bad and dangerous thing! However, with even the best of intentions, this tendency to make judgments often comes back to bite us, doesn’t it? In the times that we are living in people are very judgmental, either in public or in private. Many claim to be inclusive and non-judgmental but the moment that you disagree with them about a political or religious thing what do you receive from them? Judgment! We all are guilty at times of passing judgment. Here’s the danger of passing judgment: We can’t know the inside of another person and we rarely if ever know the “full story” of someone else!

One pastor was invited to preach at a week long conference and he was excited to arrive the opening night and get the conference started. Whenever he began preaching there was a couple that arrived a little bit late and the sanctuary was packed and the only place that still had seats was the front row… So this couple quickly came to the front and began following along. The preacher continued his message and read the text of Scripture. About 5 minutes after this point he scans through the crowd and his eyes land on the couple that walked in late and he realizes that the husband is already asleep. He continues through his message and just assumes that the man had a long day at work. The next night the exact same thing happens as the preacher begins to read through the text of Scripture and this same couple comes in late and sits on the same 2 seats in the front row. After about 10 minutes of preaching, the preacher looks and sure enough, the man is back asleep! Now the preacher begins to think that the husband must just be coming with his wife because the wife wants to attend and the husband couldn’t care less about the conference and that’s why they must be arriving late and that must be why he’s taking a nap during the message. This continues each night and finally after the last message the couple approached the preacher and the preacher was about to lay into the husband and call him out for sleeping through each night… The wife said that they were so thankful they were able to make it to this conference because this preacher had made a profound impact on their lives. The preacher was taken aback a little bit and inquired about their past. The wife said that her husband was undergoing treatment for a terminal cancer diagnosis and the medication made him drowsy but his final wish was to attend this conference in order to hear his favorite Bible teacher preach the Word in person… The preacher stood there stunned. There he was assuming that this individual was at best a lazy Christian or at worst a non-Christian snoring through his preaching. Come to find out this man was a devoted Christ-follower facing a serious illness.

This preacher was guilty of passing judgment on this man. We all are guilty of doing this from time to time. Jesus reminds us in His Word that we cannot do this because we aren’t God. We cannot pass judgment and assume that we know the whole situation and know whether someone is a Christian or not, but we can make judgments. We can analyze and use discernment to evaluate what is going on around us and what someone says. That’s no being judgmental - that’s being Biblical! Whenever someone tells you that God told them _______, it’s not being judgmental to ask them to tell you which chapter/book/verse it is that God told them that in! 1 John 4:1 commands Christians to be discerning of what’s going on and to test all things against the Word of God. Newsflash, this morning we’re going to look at Scripture and you all are responsible to “judge” this message against what the Word of God says. That’s not you being judgmental - that’s you being obedient to Scripture!

As we continue to study in the Sermon on the Mount, we arrive at one of the most misunderstood places in all of Scripture - Matthew 7:1-6. The point of this text is not to be someone who is gullible . The point of this text is not to be someone who lives a reckless lifestyle and yells, “ONLY GOD CAN JUDGE ME!” The point of this text is not to be someone who is insanely quick to find faults in others. The point of the text is to focus on Jesus. To focus on His work of transformation in our own lives. To lovingly help others grow to be more like Jesus. Today are you more focused on your appearances, making other people feel like you have it all figured out, or are you more focused on being like Jesus and humbly helping others grow to be more like Him too?

Matthew 7:1–6 CSB

1 “Do not judge, so that you won’t be judged. 2 For you will be judged by the same standard with which you judge others, and you will be measured by the same measure you use. 3 Why do you look at the splinter in your brother’s eye but don’t notice the beam of wood in your own eye? 4 Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the splinter out of your eye,’ and look, there’s a beam of wood in your own eye? 5 Hypocrite! First take the beam of wood out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to take the splinter out of your brother’s eye. 6 Don’t give what is holy to dogs or toss your pearls before pigs, or they will trample them under their feet, turn, and tear you to pieces.

Focus on God’s Standard, Not Yours (1-2)

For years and years and years it seemed as though every human being knew what John 3:16 was. It didn’t matter if the person was a regular church attender or never came to church, it just seemed like most people knew what that verse meant because they came to VBS once or because they were told it by their grandparents or something along those lines. While it’s true that not everyone literally knew the verse, it just seemed like most did. Today, though, another verse has supplanted John 3:16 in terms of popularity and cultural acceptance and it is Matthew 7:1. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve watched a tv show or a movie and the person will say, “You can’t judge me. Only God can do that.” The idea is from Matthew 7:1 as Jesus tells His listeners “Do not judge, so that you won’t be judged.” Think about how easy it is for us to pass judgment on other people. Maybe we don’t do it in public, but we certainly do it in our heads and in our homes. We see something on our social media feed and we think to ourselves or to someone else, “That’s crazy!” or “I can’t believe so and so did this… I’d never do that!” Our world loves to quote Matthew 7:1 but our world hates applying Matthew 7:1 to ourselves. We love to quote Matthew 7:1 whenever someone says something negative about us but we don’t apply Matthew 7:1 whenever we say something negative about someone else. It’s so easy for us to judge others without even thinking about it… So what must we do instead? What is Jesus’ main point in Matthew 7:1?

Again, there are times in life where we have to make a judgment. A judge must make a judgment in a court case. A driver must make a judgment whenever he or she makes a turn. A teacher must make a judgment whenever they grade a test. A police officer must make a judgment whenever they are responding to a 911 call. Jesus’ main point is not that making judgments is something that we should never do. Instead, the thrust of this passage is about not being a judgmental person and applying a hypocritical standard in life. A standard where we want to experience grace all the time and we never extend grace to others. The call from Christ, therefore, is to focus first on God’s standard and Word, not our personal opinion or feeling.

You and I have the authority to make judgments but you and I lack the authority to pass judgment. What does that mean? In a family structure, who is the one who passes judgment whenever there is a problem? Mom or Dad, right? Why do Mom or Dad have the right to pass judgment whenever a child does something wrong? Because they are in a position of authority. As a child, that might be something that you don’t always like, but trust me, there is a purpose behind loving parents exercising discipline as Proverbs 22:6 and Proverbs 13:24 shares. Now, let’s examine the relationship that we have within the church with one another. While some, yes, are older and others are younger, we don’t have this type of parental/child relationship within the body of Christ, do we? No, the Bible shares that we’re brothers and sisters = we’re equals.

Romans 14:10 CSB

10 But you, why do you judge your brother or sister? Or you, why do you despise your brother or sister? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God.

Because we’re brothers and sisters, only our Father can pass judgment on us and one day He will!

Think of how otherworldly this idea seems to us. Everyone in our world judges others. Can you imagine how unique the Church would be if we lived out Matthew 7:1 to it’s rightful conclusion? Can you imagine if instead of having a negative and critical attitude of others we replaced that with an attitude of helping others out and loving our neighbor and praying for those who persecute us? That almost sounds like what Jesus tells us to do… Wait, that’s what He’s already mentioned in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5 and 6! Sinclair Ferguson shares that, “The heart that has tasted the Lord’s grace and forgiveness will always be restrained in its judgment of others. It has seen itself deserving judgment and condemnation before the Lord and yet, instead of experiencing His burning anger, has tasted His infinite mercy.”

If you’ve experienced God’s forgiveness and mercy, you are now responsible to extend that same forgiveness and mercy to others rather than passing judgment and anger upon others. Is that easy to do? Absolutely not! But have you ever had it done to you? Have you ever done something wrong and instead of being met with frustration, you were meet with forgiveness?

Have you read the story of the Prodigal Son in Luke 15 before? We’ll take a few weeks and study this chapter sometime, but at the end of Luke 15 we arrive at the Prodigal getting his inheritance from his father and leaving home in order to go and squander everything. Things get so bad that he eventually decides to return home because he has nothing to eat and says that even the servants that work for his dad live better than he was living. He had made foolish choices and decisions. He had wasted away 1/3 of the father’s possessions and decides to come home. What happens when he arrives? Does he get home and get a good spanking? Maybe he needed one but that’s not what happens. Does he get a stern talking to? Maybe he needed one but that’s not what happens either. Instead the father runs out to meet him and throws a feast because his lost son had come back home. The son had done everything wrong and was met with nothing but grace and love. God is all about restoration… We must seek it as well!

This is our response should be like whenever we interact with others, especially those who we are tempted to judge. Give them grace. It doesn’t mean that you welcome them back and let them hurt you again, but give them the same grace that you’d like to be given.

Focus on Your Own Eye First (3-5)

We extend this grace to others because we’ve been given more grace than we could ever possibly deserve! Jesus gives us one of the most convicting images in all of Scripture in these next few verses as he shares that we need to focus on our own sinfulness before we even think of focusing on others. In His words, we need to get the log out of our eye before we take the splinter out of someone else’s! This is comical on the one hand but convicting on the other. Some of you work with wood and we’ve all felt the pain of a splinter. Think of the similarities and differences for a moment.

A log or beam of wood is large and heavy. It can be transform into a variety of things from a 2 by 4, a baseball bat, or even a yard stick. A beam of wood is big - a splinter of wood is miniscule. A splinter of wood likely came off of a beam of wood but can’t really do much because of its small size. Yet, both pieces of wood can be flat out annoying. Logs can cause destruction and splinters can cause frustration because we don’t know that we have one until we take a step and our foot immediately begins to throb and man can those things be next to impossible to get out from your skin! We hate splinters… So why do you think Jesus uses them in this example in Matthew 7?

We hate splinters and we want to remove them whenever we notice them. Have you ever been around someone who does something that drives you a little crazy? Take a nervous habit for example. Some people bit their nails. Other people twist their hair. Other people fidget or stutter. Whenever we’re around people that do something that can drive us a little bit crazy, it can feel like a splinter in our hand or foot and we desperately want to walk over and tell people to stop doing whatever they’re doing because it’s driving us crazy. What we often fail to remember, though, is that we have our own splinters too. We have our own nervous habits. We have things in our lives that drive other people crazy - yet, it’s so easy for us to see splinters in the lives of others. It’s easy to see the flaws of other people and, for good and bad, we are tempted to be the person who walks up to someone else’s splinter and say, “Hey, let me fix this for you!” Even if you have good intentions, this can be strange, painful, and lead to short and long term hurt. Instead of jumping at the opportunity to remove the splinter, Jesus says that first we have to notice and address the log in our own eye first.

Sometimes we are quick to notice the log in our own eye. We understand that we have certain areas of weakness and we’re aware of them, at least at times. In high school I had a friend in band who was an extremely gifted Clarinet player and who has gone on to be a professional musician and record music and play with some well known groups. This individual was extremely disciplined and always had a standard of perfection - something that many of us have in some capacity. During his senior year he had made the All-District band and was about to audition for the All-State band. He had this lofty standard and had practiced for years and years for this moment… He came out of the audition and was obviously frustrated. He said that he didn’t do a good job and that he had made some silly mistakes and could have done much better. Fast forward 4-5 hours later and the results are about to be announced. Not only did he make the All-State list, he was given the designation of being 1st chair All-State. That would be the equivalent of being named the top QB in the state of Missouri. This was a tremendous honor and surprising to the individual because he was focused on his mistakes. Maybe this is your personality. Maybe you’re someone who truly does notice the log in your own eye as you understand that you do make mistakes and at times you are your own worst critic.

Talking about humans as a whole, though, this isn’t normal. Usually we’re content with who we are and what we do. Sure, we have our shortcomings but we love to talk about our strengths. In fact, most job interviews not only ask an interviewee about their strengths but also about their weaknesses! Why is this the case? Because we can turn blind to our own problems… But boy can we tell other people about their problems!

Jesus’ command is simply this: Take the log out of your own eye first.

We read of a person in Scripture who does a great job of talking about other people’s problems while denying his own… Think of the story in the Bible of David and Bathsheba. Think of the commands that David had broken. He lied. He committed adultery. He coveted his neighbor’s wife. He dishonored his parents. Though he didn’t specifically murder anyone he gave orders for her husband to be put into harms way so that he could die. David broke 5 of the 10 commandments in this one situation! You could say that he had a redwood tree in his own eyeball - yet whenever the prophet Nathan confronts him about a situation where a rich man stole and slaughtered the only lamb that a poor man had, David says with vengeance that that rich man deserves to die. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black! Nathan cries back to David and says, “You are that man!”

David was the king - he had everything but he wasn’t satisfied. It can be easy to hear that story and think of the good things we’ve done or the bad things we haven’t done! I haven’t committed adultery or gotten someone killed therefore I really don’t have that big of a log to get rid of.

The Bible tells us that we all have sinned. We’re all guilty before God. We all have a log in our eye that we must repent of and ask God to help us get rid of. But look at the end of verse 5. If something is happening and we know something is wrong, are we supposed to just let things go on without confronting it? This is why Matthew 7:1-6 is such a hard text to fully understand. Yes, we don’t have the authority to pass judgment on someone’s soul, but we do have the God-given authority to evaluate sinful actions. How do we go about this process? Do we start with the other person and do we lay into them and give them a report of all of their shortcomings? If you’ve had that happen to you by a self-proclaimed Christian, I apologize because that’s wrong. If you’re a Christian here today, Jesus’ commands are simple to follow: The biggest problem in your life is your sin. You need His help to fix that problem. After you have taken the log out of your own eye, then and only then are you able to see clearly enough to lovingly help someone else out.

Jesus shares that it is correct and right to humbly and lovingly correct someone who is in sin. Even though we don’t like correction, it’s a wonderful thing to have people in your corner who are there for you whenever you take a wrong turn instead of leaving you off to your own destruction.

Galatians 6:1–2 CSB

1 Brothers and sisters, if someone is overtaken in any wrongdoing, you who are spiritual, restore such a person with a gentle spirit, watching out for yourselves so that you also won’t be tempted. 2 Carry one another’s burdens; in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.

How do we carry one another’s burdens? By being there for them in the good and the bad. By encouraging them through difficult times and offering Biblical counsel whenever they’ve done something wrong. I’m not sure if it’s cultural but for some reason we think that it’s sinful and judgmental whenever sin is called sin… It’s not! Paul in Ephesians 4:15 shares that we must speak the truth in love. That’s what we are called to do in the body of Christ. We pray that God would humble us to the point that we can lovingly help others to grow to be more like Christ.

Whenever I was a junior in high school my best friend sat me down and said that he loved me but that he had seen some stuff go on in my life that he was genuinely concerned about. We talked for nearly 2 hours and it was awkward but man oh man, looking back on that conversation am I thankful that he loved me enough to offer that Biblical correction to some selfish actions that I had been taking. The most loving thing that we can do for one another is to help each other grow to be more like Christ. This requires much prayer and discernment, but Jesus does share that we can help a brother or sister with a splinter problem only after we focus on our own eye and problems first.

Focus on Your God-Given Mission (6)

Verse 6 concludes this paragraph of Scripture with a call to be discerning as Jesus exhorts his disciples to not give what is holy to dogs or pigs. What is He getting to with this final verse? Earlier in Matthew 5, Jesus told His disciples that they are commanded to love their enemies and in Matthew 7:1 they are not commanded to not play the role of God and be judgmental over their enemies. So how do we balance everything in the Sermon on the Mount up until this point with Matthew 7:5-6?

Whenever we think of pigs we might think of yummy bacon and sausage but in Jesus’ day pigs were considered unclean and they were vicious animals like wild boars today. Dogs aren’t the household pets that we know and love but they were wild and capable of great destruction. So how does Jesus say to deal with people who love to cause destruction? We love them. We pray for them. We share the Gospel with them in word and in deed. But there will come a time where we have to pull away and heed the advice of Proverbs 9 as we find

Proverbs 9:8 CSB

8 Don’t rebuke a mocker, or he will hate you; rebuke the wise, and he will love you.

This doesn’t mean that you stop talking to non-Christians. This doesn’t mean that you view people who don’t agree with you all the time as pigs and dogs - this is an extreme situation for only those who persistently mock and defile the things of Christ. For those who reject Christ or those who are confused about Christ, we are given a command to go therefore and make disciples. Our responsibility as Christians is to be patient because our God has been patient with us. The mission before us is to glorify God and proclaim His Gospel until the whole world hears. Many will reject the message. But some will accept it. His Word promises to not return void!

Conclusion

What are your eyes looking at today?

During the storms of this life our focus can easily go a million different directions and we can be tempted to focus on lots of splinters and specks instead of focusing on our sinful condition and seeking first God’s Kingdom in our lives. As you evaluate where you stand this morning, I encourage you to do a spiritual eye exam. Just like the eye doctor has you cover up an eye and read some letters, do the same thing today. Maybe you a temptation to look at all the bad that other people are doing and you hold that over them and it’s easy for you to fall into the trap of being judgmental. Cover up that eye and evaluate where you stand today. Are there areas in your life where you need to ask for forgiveness and repent? Before you assume the worst in someone else, pray that God would give you discernment to evaluate the fruit (a Biblical and good thing to do) rather than judging the root of another person (something only God can do).

4 things for us to do during this eye checkup:

Check your motives. Are you playing the role of God or are you trying to love your brother or sister?

Examine your own walk. Are you walking in step with the Spirit yourself?

Speak the truth in love. Don’t water down the truth and call sin acceptable - but don’t be a jerk along the way.

Treat others as Christ has treated you: with love, forgiveness, and grace that you could never deserve by yourself.

Spurgeon once said, “You are not to judge, but you are not to act without judgment. You are not to be judges but you are not to be a fool.”