Judging
Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measurement ye mete, it shall be measured to you again. And why beholdest thou the mote (speck) that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and them shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye. Matthew 7:1-5
When folks do not wish to be held accountable they quickly quote the Scripture - judge not that ye be not judged. It is a common defense for escaping scrutiny and artfully turning the pointed finger 180 degrees. However, at the other extreme, it is also a commonly used rationale for overly pious Christians to demonstrate their high good holiness, and therefore they sometimes fail to use the wisdom available to them. Discerning is not the same as judging. We have many Scriptures that give us the authority to determine if we are in the company of evil and we can therefore choose to flee or stop associating with that evil. What part do we have with Belial... (2 Cor. 6:14-16)? However, all that said, it is just as important to know that God never gives us discernment so that we may criticize another, but only so that we may intercede with prayer. The trick is to learn to recognize when it is necessary to use discernment and when it isn’t necessary to judge. In both cases, the right decision will always bear fruit and the wrong decision will cause the vine to wither.
Sometimes, even when we fully understand the subtle distinction between spiritual discernment and the more fleshly passing judgment, regardless of our good intentions to be righteous, we often judge others anyway and in so doing we unknowingly begin to separate ourselves from Christ, Who is squeezed out by our own bloated self-righteousness. And that, in a nutshell, is what defines the word judging in the judge-not scripture, i.e., simply feeling superior to or jealous/resentful of someone else, either in worldly or spiritual terms. Unfortunately, when we do this, God quietly retreats and lets us stew in our own faux holy juices for a season. During this time we might seek others to share our opinion and we talk amongst ourselves about the one we are judging, bolstered by the “witnesses of two or more” and therefore justify in our own minds that we are only speaking truth. We determine that we would never do what the one we are judging has done. We are more mature, we have more sense, we never make bad choices, we are wise, self-sufficient and are therefore never in a position of need. We are better.
Many things can halt this destructive process but if we continue in this vein, God retreats further instead of correcting us and thus He allows us to grow even more pious. Unfortunately God will not reside where there is any other god before Him and when we elevate ourselves to judgeship we have also elevated ourselves to a type of godship. If this moves along unchecked, inevitably a small dark empty place begins to open up in us. It begins as a vague discomfort and we cannot explain it. But in the simplest terms it is merely the absence of God. We might try to fill it by doing good works and speaking superficially good words. Most Christians have an entire vocabulary of good words and phrases to hide behind. We might look for charitable venues to prove to ourselves, and others, how benevolent and selfless we are, thus how devoted to God we are. We might join one or more Christian fellowships to study the Word to learn more good words. But eventually we might find our prayer life has begun to lose ferver and that our words of worship begin to ring hollow and then our spiritual light slowly begins to dim and we don’t really know why. Haven’t we followed the pious formula to a T? It must be Satan trying to rob us of our peace and joy, we conclude.
This is the dangerous path of self-righteousness and it leads to a fork in the road where we must eventually choose to go one way or another. The right choice will circle you back home. But the way is purposefully not marked for us at the divide, only way back at the start which is a truth like a gem we tuck in our pocket and then discover it fell out somewhere along the way. At this crossroad our only hope for making the right choice is humility and prayer; without it we will take the wrong road without fail. Unfortunately, at the end of the wrong road we find ourselves being judged as we have judged. That’s the For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged... part.
The rest of the story is, Matthew 7:1-5 is not a free ride for the one who is being judged, who might indeed need to be judged, rather it is a call to true righteousness for the one who decides not to judge. In similar vein, forgiveness is not as beneficial to the one forgiven as it is for the forgiver. We each answer to God for our own behaviors, one-on-One. There is none good but God and only He is able and qualified. If we find we are looking at others with a hard view and yet we also find this attitude is not bearing fruit, we should look to our own hearts the way God does and ask the hard question, how are we disappointing Him? Has He stepped back because we have decided we can do His job better?
If the answer to the difficult question is convicting, there is a simple remedy. Love one another, warts and all, and let God do the judging.
(1 John 3:18,19) [My] Little children, let us not love in word, neither with the tongue; but in deed and truth. Hereby shall we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our heart before him:
|
