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Sermon
on the Mount series
Judging – Sermon on the Mount series, #9 –
4.13.8
Dennis Mullen
It used to be that the best-known verse in the Bible was John 3:16. Among Christians and non-Christians alike, the one Bible verse that everyone knew, the one verse that summed up Christianity and Christ Himself was: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” No more. Now (I hear) the best known and most quoted verse is Matthew 7:1 – “Judge not, that ye be not judged.”
It’s an important shift. John 3:16 stresses God’s love AND speaks of our need for rescue (or else we perish). Matthew 7:1, at least as it is popularly used, seems to speak of tolerance in the worst sense – letting everyone do what they think is right in their own eyes without saying a word about it.
And yet, here it is in the Sermon on the Mount, at the start of Matthew 7 where we now arrive in our series: MT 7:1 "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.
MT 7:3 "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? 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.
One of my early experiences with judging is illustrated by the picture on your bulletin. That is a photo of the grand champion market hog at the Oklahoma central district market hog show in 2007. The reason he’s there is that he brings back memories. In the mid to late 70s when I was 12, 13, and 14 years old, my springs and summers revolved around selecting the right feeder pig and raising him up to show at the Holmes County Fair 4H hog contest (in Ohio) in August.
What does that have to do with judging? Well, when you show a hog, you take him into a show ring with 15 or 20 others and you make every attempt to guide him around with a cane in front of a judge who looks all of the hogs over and judges which ones are the best.
What makes a fine hog? Well, I never quite figured that out. One year, my two hogs DID win third place and fifth place overall at the fair, but it’s really just the top two that matter, and I never made it there. I know that the judges were looking for a long, lean, muscular hog, ready for eating. In five or ten minutes, the judge would give the verdict on my work for that year. That judgment didn’t take into account a lot of things that I think you’ll agree are pretty important:
In fact, the only thing a good judge of hog flesh cares about is the size and shape of your market hog on contest day. It may not be fair, but that’s competition, and that’s judging.
OK, I’m pretty sure Jesus had NONE of that in mind when he said 1 "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. But think of the parallels. When you judge someone in the way that Jesus forbids here, you have to narrow your focus down to their appearance or actions in a given place and time, and you have to forget a lot of other things that are very important. When you judge someone, you look only at the way they dress, for example, or the length of their hair or the number of exposed tattoos or body piercings, or you pay attention only to their vocabulary or their accent, or the car they drive; or you focus on their behavior in one situation or one moment, and you deliberately forget the rest of their lives. Forgetting or ignoring information is the real key to judging others. In fact, one of the best ways to define “judging” is to talk about all the things you have to forget.
Judging someone means forgetting…
Unseen motives. I see you doing something that displeases me, and I forget that your motives might be deeper than they appear. Years ago I was at church camp. It was about the middle of the week, and some guests showed up, a husband and wife team, and they were supposed to speak to us at the worship service that night. Just before dinner I was walking along and I saw this married couple off by themselves, and I heard them arguing. In fact, the way the husband raised his voice and spoke so disrespectfully to his wife really turned me off, and I knew right away that he was an idiot and a phony who had nothing worthwhile to say to me that night in chapel. That’s pretty cut-and-dried, isn’t it? I mean every couple has their disagreements, but if you can’t come to a youth camp and keep it together for even a few hours, go get some counseling!
Chapel time arrived and this couple got up to speak, and they started with a skit…and in this skit, they played a married couple having an argument…and I realized that what I had overheard was the two of them rehearsing for tonight’s service! And what I just KNEW was one thing turned out to be something else entirely. The odd thing is that my feelings didn’t fall in line right away with the facts. I continued to have a negative reaction to this guy based on what I thought I saw even AFTER I knew my mistake! Feelings and emotions play a big part in judging, but they are often inaccurate.
When we’re tempted to judge, we need to remember the strong possibility of unseen motives. Now of course there are a few situations where motives HAVE to be ignored, at least for the moment, in the interest of taking action against a bad situation. If a guy is waving a pistol around in the bank lobby, you don’t stand there and say, “Well maybe he has a good reason. Maybe he’s upset about all the pens being chained down Who am I to judge?” But those situations are fairly rare, and unseen motives often need to be remembered.
Unknown circumstances. (It would be easy to judge these example of bad parking, for example). Remember the old story about the guy who gets on a city bus with his three small children? He just parks himself in a seat and the kids start running wild, fighting with each other, climbing over seats, annoying the other passengers. You see this kind of irresponsible parenting all the time, right? Mom on her cell phone at the grocery store while kids show blatant disrespect to everyone and everything. Well in this case, someone spoke up and said, “Excuse me, sir. Your kids are kind of out of control”. And it was like he awoke from a dream and he said: “We just came from their mother’s funeral. I don’t know how to deal with it, and I guess they don’t either”. Talk about unknown circumstances! (BTW if anyone ever calls you out about your kids’ behavior, try that one!)
When someone judges me unfairly (and sometimes it is FAIR judgment and I should listen to it) I am most likely to appeal to circumstances they don’t know about. “You didn’t like that sermon? Well maybe if you had the week I had you’d understand!” Sometimes parents get into such a rhythm of correcting their kids and putting down childish excuses that they don’t stop to listen when their son or daughter has a real problem, an unknown circumstance, a conflict with a friend or trouble with schoolwork that really would change Mom or Dad’s opinion if they knew it.
Last Sunday I was standing by the glass doors in the Atrium when I saw a log come rolling down the hill. I also saw a boy standing out there by the carport watching it roll, and I went outside and said to him, “OK, that’s dangerous, stop that and take it back up.” And he was very respectful and agreeable, which made me stop and think: “You know, since he’s standing at the bottom of the hill, he probably didn’t roll the log from the top!” About that time, three other faces appeared at the top, so I quickly judged them too and made them come down and carry the log back up” (where it is available to be rolled down again today – so this was a banner day for my exercise of wisdom!) But the point is that it’s too easy to overlook circumstances or to fail to even think that there may be something unknown that would completely change my judgment.
Speaking of logs, judging means forgetting…
My own sin – that’s what Jesus means when he talks about the log or plank in my eye. MT 7:3 "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? 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. If I have a splinter in my eye, I hope you’ll help me get it out, and I want to do the same for you. If I have sin in my life that is going to damage me and perhaps even lead me away from God, I hope I can count on you to help me get it out, and I want to do the same for you. The problem is, if I have an even bigger splinter in my eye, it’s going to make me a little ham-fisted in doing surgery on your eye, and if I have an even bigger sin in my life, especially sin that I haven’t even admitted or started working on, then it’s going to make my help to you do more harm than good.
I can’t wait till I’m sinless before I try to help you, and I can’t have you wait till you’re sinless before you speak to me about my sin. Otherwise, we’d never help each other. But “help” becomes judging when we ignore our own sin and choose to condemn someone else for theirs.
For example: We think we have something to say about gay marriage. It is surprising if those who don’t want to hear it point to our divorce rates, which are as high as anyone’s? This is especially true if we’re arrogant and mean-spirited in the way we talk about others. Or we want to chime in during this election year on moral issues. Is it shocking that folks who don’t want to listen point to how materialistic and wasteful many Christians are?
If you’re an angry person and everyone knows it, and then you confront me about an angry episode on my part, it’s easy (too easy) for me to ignore your criticism because of the log in your eye. If my life is a lie – I cheat on my taxes and consistently fail to keep my promises – it doesn’t carry much weight if I call you a liar, does it?
So, while it’s true that none of us can be sinless before we confront, it’s even more true that our constructive criticism turns into judging when we forget our own sin. So, 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.
Most importantly, judging means forgetting love, forgetting to treat others the way I want to be treated – actually forgetting to treat them the way I treat myself. After all, there is somebody who always gives me the benefit of the doubt, who always knows that there are extenuating circumstances to my every action and unseen motives to every apparent sin. There is a person who always knows that I don’t mean the rotten things that I say and that I’m a pretty good person in spite of the hateful things I do. There is a friend that sticks closer than a brother, and in this case I’m not talking about Jesus, I’m talking about ME. If one of the other ministers comes in late, I might put it down as a character flaw. If I do it, I know it’s because I’m not a slave to the clock. When Jesus tells me elsewhere to love my neighbor as I love myself, I’m pretty sure that he is talking about this tendency I have to cut myself some slack and see the whole picture. It’s a tendency I probably apply too much to myself and not enough to other people. When I judge people I forget to treat them with this kind of love. Actually, I forget to care about them at all.
We could probably switch the word “judge” for the word “condemn” and clarify the meaning. Judging = condemnation. We know that John 3:16 says that God so loved the world that he gave his son. John 3:17 says: 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. God didn’t send his son to condemn the world. And he didn’t send me to condemn the world either. Or you. So don’t condemn, or you’ll be condemned by others in the same manner.
On the other hand…
With all that said, v. 6 is a quick change-of-course where Jesus actually brings up pigs again: MT 7:6 "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 then turn and tear you to pieces. That is strange, isn’t it. Don’t judge…unless you’re dealing with dogs or swine.
In early church history, some folks said that this means the Gospel isn’t for Gentiles like us – but that’s an idea the NT contradicts. Others have used it to justify excluding people of any race or ethnic group they didn’t like. Jesus didn’t mean any of that.
If you read through Matthew’s gospel, it is clear that the most sacred things are the things of God and the pearl of great price is the Kingdom of God (Jesus even calls it that in Matthew 13:45-46). Now we had a lot of pigs on our farm and few if any pearls. If we had happened to have some pearls and we threw them to the swine, they would have tried to eat them – that’s what they’re all about – and then they would have trampled them underfoot.
There are people who feel that way about the things of God, about the Gospel. That’s not my judgment – just ask them, they’ll tell you. They’ve heard the message and they aren’t the least bit open to it. Maybe they are your parents or your neighbors, or maybe even someone living in your own home. That doesn’t make them pigs or dogs – that would be to take Jesus’ word-picture too far. But why would you take something precious and sacred and keep pushing it at them so they can toss it down?
I think Jesus throws this out there to temper “do not judge” with some wisdom. There are some people who aren’t ready for Jesus. It doesn’t mean they never will be; it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t pray for them – in fact, that’s the most important thing you CAN do. But the church would be in a lot better shape if more of us learned to discern where God was working in someone’s life, and where he has been shut out for now.
Then look down in vs. 15-23 - MT 7:15 "Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. 16 By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? 17 Likewise every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. 18 A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. 19 Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20 Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.
It’s that passage that causes some people to say that we aren’t to be judges but we have to be fruit inspectors. Just because someone claims to be a Christian doesn’t mean that you trust everything they do. There are many con-men in this world, many thieves and predators who will use ANY leverage they can get with you to swindle you out of what they want. Why wouldn’t they use Christianity? It’s just another game to them. So don’t give your money or your heart to just anyone you meet in church, and don’t be so quick to praise people just because they say a beautiful prayer or share a moving insight from Scripture in class. Be wise. Look at what they produce long-term.
Jesus make it as clear as it can be in this last paragraph:
MT 7:21 "Not everyone who says to me, `Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22 Many will say to me on that day, `Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?' 23 Then I will tell them plainly, `I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!'
So, in amazing wisdom, Jesus, in just a few paragraphs deals, with our natural tendency to judge one another…and THEN he confronts the opposite tendency we have, to act like “Do Not Judge” is the only verse in the Bible. When we are tempted to disapprove or dismiss someone, he makes us think about what we might be forgetting. Hidden motives? Unseen circumstances? My own sin? Love? Who do I think I am, deciding in my heart that someone is rotten when I don’t have any idea what they’re going through? Could I withstand the same type of judgment against me?
And then, just when I’m starting to figure out that this means I can get away with murder or at least theft and tell my accusers that they have no right to judge me, Jesus says: “Don’t be stupid. Look for the fruit of righteousness over the long term before you hand over the keys of your life or your eternity to someone.” Jesus says that there IS such a thing as a FALSE prophet, and there is such a thing as a false Christian who uses Jesus to get what is yours. Be WISE!
But be loving too. Be careful in your dealings with people, but don’t put yourself in the judgment seat over everyone.
Morrison Hill Christian Church - P.O. Box 59 - 1008 E.
Race St.
Kingston, TN 37763 (865) 376-5205
