A man went to see his doctor in an acute state of anxiety. “Doctor,” he said, “you have to help me. I'm dying. Everywhere I touch it hurts. I touch my head and it hurts. I touch my leg and it hurts. I touch my stomach and it hurts. I touch my chest and it hurts. You have to help me, Doc, everything hurts.”
The doctor gave him a complete examination. “Mr. Smith,” he said, “I have good news and bad news for you. The good news is you are not dying. The bad news is you have a broken finger.” (David Holdaway, Kincardinshire, Scotland, www.PreachingToday.com)
We live in a broken and hurting world, which can leave us in an acute state of anxiety. People we love can make poor decisions, which cause an unbelievable amount of pain, and we want to help.
But how? How do we help people find healing for their pain? How do we help people recover from their failure? How do we help people get out of the trap of their sin? Well, if you have your Bibles, I invite you to turn with me to Matthew 7, Matthew 7, where Jesus shows us how to help people experiencing the pain of their own sin.
Matthew 7:1 Judge not, that you be not judged. (ESV)
If you truly want to help people recover from their failure...
DON’T CONDEMN THEM.
Don’t criticize those who mess up. Don’t separate yourself from them as those who are less worthy than you.
The word for “judge” literally means to separate, or to distinguish. And in this context, it speaks of those who separate themselves from those they consider “bad.” They distinguish themselves as “good” as compared to those “bad people” and treat them with contempt.
The problem with that is we’re ALL sinners. The Bible says, “None is righteous, no, not one” (Romans 3:10); “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). So we cannot separate (or distinguish) ourselves from the so-called “bad” people.
Michael Shermer, publisher of Skeptic magazine interviewed Thomas Keneally, the author of Schindler's List. Shermer asked Keneally what he thought the difference was between Oskar Schindler, rescuer of Jews and hero of his story, and Amon Goeth, the Nazi commandant of the Plaszow concentration camp.
Kneally replied, “Not much. Had there been no war, Mr. Schindler and Mr. Goeth might have been drinking buddies and business partners, morally obtuse, perhaps, but relatively harmless.”
“What a difference a war makes,” Shermer comments, “especially to the moral choices that lead to good and evil”
Then Shermer goes on to quote Russian author Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn: “If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?” (Michael Shermer, “Something Evil Comes This Way,” www.skeptic.com, 3-18-04; www.PreachingToday.com)
Did you hear that? The line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of EVERY human being. It cuts through your heart and mine, so there is no separating ourselves from the “bad” people; there is no distinguishing “our kind” from “their kind.”
And those who do only invite judgment, or condemnation, upon themselves. That’s the point Jesus makes in verse 2. Take a look at it.
Matthew 7:2 For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you. (ESV)
To condemn sinners is only to condemn yourself, and the same standard you use will be used against you.
In Luke 6, Jesus put it this way: “Judge not, and you will not be judged; condemn not, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you will be forgiven; give, and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use it will be measured back to you” (Luke 6:37-38).
What you dish out will come back to you, whether its commendation or condemnation, whether its compliments or criticism. What you dish out will come back to you, whether its grace or blame.
Jud Wilhite is pastor of Central Christian Church in Las Vegas. In his book Uncensored Grace, he tells the story of Cody Huff, one of his church members. Before Cody became a member of the church, he was sleeping in an open field next to the church. Before that, Cody was making loads of money as a famous bass pro fisherman who had been featured on ESPN.
Then crack cocaine got a hold of him. His addiction to crack led him to smoke up $600,000 worth of savings, his house, his Harley, and his new boat. A man who had eaten at the finest of restaurants and socialized with celebrities smoked away everything he had and ended up homeless.
But then God got a hold of him. Some people from Jud’s church were handing out sandwiches in the park where Cody slept, and they told him he could get a shower at Central Christian Church. The last place Cody wanted to go was a church, but he hadn't bathed in so long that even other homeless men couldn't stand his smell anymore. Cody explained what happened next:
So Cody walked into the church, and a lady named Michelle, who knew him from the homeless ministry, said, “Good morning, Cody. How are you?” Then she looked at him and said, “Cody, you need a hug.”
Cody replied, “Honey, you don't want to touch me because I haven't had a shower in 3 months.” Well, if Michelle heard him, she didn't seem to care. She walked up, looked in his eyes, gave him a big hug, and told him that Jesus loved him. “In that split second,” Cody says, “I was somebody. She even remembered my name. That was the point where I knew that God was alive in this world.”
Over the next several weeks, Cody's life began to be restored. He gave his life to Christ, and he started leading a Bible study in the park for other homeless people. Now, he has his own business, he's married, and he and his wife serve faithfully in their church’s homeless ministry every weekend. God changed his life! But it all started with a big hug from one of Jesus’ followers. (Jud Wilhite, Uncensored Grace, Mulnomah, 2008; www.PreachingToday.com)
Do you want to really help people recover from their failure? Then start with a hug. Lead with compassion, not condemnation. If you want to truly help somebody, 1st, don’t condemn. Then 2nd...
CLEAN UP YOUR OWN LIFE FIRST.
And lead by example, not examination. Or as Jesus put it, “Take the log out of your own eye before you try to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.”
Matthew 7:3-5 Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye. (ESV)
I love the humor! Imagine, someone with a log in his own eye trying to remove a piece of sawdust in someone else’s eye. It’s comical, but it can be catastrophic, as well.
It’s like the man who goes to see the family doctor. He says, “I think my wife is deaf. She never hears me the first time I say something. In fact, I often have to repeat things over and over again.”
“Well,” the doctor replies, “go home tonight, stand about 15 feet from her, and say something. If she doesn't reply, move about five feet closer and say it again. Keep doing this so we can get an idea of the severity of her deafness.”
Sure enough, the husband goes home, and he does exactly what the doctor told him to do. He stands about 15 feet from his wife, who is in the kitchen, chopping some vegetables, and he asks, “Honey, what's for dinner?”
He gets no response, so he moves about five feet closer and asks again.
“Honey, what's for dinner?”
No reply.
He moves five feet closer, and still no reply.
He gets fed up and moves right behind her—about an inch away—and asks one final time, “Honey, what's for dinner?”
She replies, “For the fourth time, vegetable stew!” (Aaron Goerner, Utica, New York; www.PreachingToday.com)
Who had the hearing problem? Certainly NOT the wife! So it is when we become critical of other people. Who has the bigger problem? No doubt, it’s the one who is critical, because a critical spirit comes from a proud heart, and a proud heart leads to a fall every time!
Thomas a Kempis put it this way hundreds of years ago: “We blame small things in others and pass over greater things in ourselves. Quickly enough we feel and weigh up what we endure from others; but how much others bear from us we do not notice.” (Thomas a Kempis, The Imitation of Christ, www.Preaching Today.com)
We certainly notice the way people hurt us long before we notice the way we hurt them. Oh, my dear friends, before you examine the fault in others, examine your own faults and deal with them first. Lead by example and not by examination.
John Wooden, former basketball coach at UCLA, was unlike many of today's coaches. He seldom left his seat on the Bruins bench during a UCLA game. He said, “I tried to teach players that if they lose their temper or get out of control, they will get beat. Modeling was better than words.”
With that philosophy, Wooden set records that may never be broken in college basketball. From 1948 to 1975, he had a win-loss record of 885-203—a phenomenal career winning percentage of .813. He had an 88-game winning streak at UCLA. Players such as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Bill Walton, and Walt Hazzard played under him.
A reporter once pressed Wooden to be critical of former Indiana University coach Bobby Knight, but Wooden would only say, “I think Bob Knight is an outstanding teacher of the game of basketball... I don't approve of his methods, but I'm not a judge, and I'm not judging Bob Knight. There is so much bad in the best of us and so much good in the worst of us, it hardly behooves me to talk about the rest of us." (Abilene Reporter-News, 5-18-00; www.PreachingToday.com)
Wow! I wish more people had that attitude. It would certainly make our world a better place, because critical condemnation only hurts; it never helps.
Oswald Chambers put it this way: “A man who is continually criticized becomes good for nothing, the effect of criticism knocks all the gumption and power out of him” (Oswald Chambers, Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, www.PreachingToday.com)
So, if you want to truly help people recover from failure, lead with compassion, not ondemnation, and lead by example, not by examination. In other words, don’t condemn; clean up your own life first; and finally...
COUNSEL ONLY THOSE WHO ARE OPEN TO IT.
Lead with wisdom, not words, and don’t force your advice on those who don’t want it. Don’t give truth to those who are not ready to hear it. Jesus said...
Matthew 7:6 Do not give dogs what is holy, and do not throw your pearls before pigs, lest they trample them underfoot and turn to attack you. (ESV)
Jesus original audience considered pigs and dogs as unclean animals. They had a saying, which said, “The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire” (2 Peter 2:22). In Jesus’ day, pigs typically ate the nastiest food, and dogs were scavengers, consuming even human blood. Stray dogs were known to growl at those who tossed them food as well as those who ignored them. (Craig Keener, IVP Bible Background Commentary)
Now, that’s what happens when you toss out unsolicited advice. At best, people growl at you; and at worst, they attack you. This is especially true of hypocrites, because that’s who the pigs and dogs are in this context (Matthew 6:2,5,16; 7:5).
Proverbs 23:9 says, “Do not speak in the hearing of a fool, for he will despise the good sense of your words.” (ESV)
On February 22, 1911, Gaston Hervieu climbed the Eiffel Tower to test a new parachute for pilots. He checked the wind, took a nervous breath, and began the test. His silk parachute filled with air, then sailed safely to the ground. Hervieu did not make the jump himself; he used a 160-pound test dummy. To one man this was an outrage. Franz Reichelt was an Austrian tailor who was developing a parachute of his own. He denounced Hervieu's use of a dummy as a “sham” and, one year later, on the morning of Sunday, February 4, 1912, he arrived at the Eiffel Tower to conduct his own experiment.
As Reichelt posed for pictures he announced, “I am so convinced my device will work properly that I will jump myself.” Gaston Hervieu pulled him aside and tried to stop him. Hervieu claimed there were technical reasons why Reichelt's parachute would not work. The two men had a heated discussion until, finally, Reichelt walked away.
Modern parachutes use 700 square feet of fabric and should be deployed only above 250 feet; Reichelt's parachute used less than 350 square feet of fabric, and he deployed it at 187 feet. He had neither the surface area nor the altitude needed to make a successful jump. Hervieu was not the only one who had told Reichelt that his parachute suit would not work. It had also been rejected by a team of experts who told him, “The surface of your device is too small. You will break your neck.”
Reichelt not only ignored experts, he also ignored his own data. He tested his parachute using dummies, and they crashed. He tested his parachute by jumping thirty feet into a haystack, and he crashed. He tested his parachute by jumping twenty feet without a haystack, and he crashed and broke his leg. Instead of changing his invention, he clung to his bad idea in the face of all evidence and advice.
Reichelt fell for four seconds, accelerating constantly, until he hit the ground at sixty miles an hour, making a cloud of frost and dust and a dent six inches deep. He was killed on impact. (Kevin Ashton, How to Fly a Horse, Doubleday, 2015, pp. 88-89; www.PreachingToday.com)
There are a lot of people like Reichelt. They’re so full of themselves, they won’t listen to sound advice. It’s like someone once said: “You can always tell an expert, but you can’t tell him much!”
So don’t waste your time. Don’t throw your pearls before pigs. Instead, wait until people are ready to hear the truth. Wait until life brings them low enough that they’re willing to look up. Wait until God humbles them enough to be open to the truth.
In the meantime, keep on loving them and keep on showing them the way. Then when they are open, don’t give them YOUR advice; point them to Jesus, because He is the Holy One; He is the precious pearl.
In Matthew 13, Jesus said, “The kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls, who, on finding one pearl of great value, went and sold all that he had and bought it” (Matthew 13:45-46).
Jesus is worth everything you’ve got! Nothing compares to Him, and nobody can fix broken people like He can.
Hebrews 7 says, “He is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him” (Hebrews 7:25).
He died on a cross for your sins and rose again to give you a new life, an eternal abundant life, but only if you’re willing to admit your own powerlessness and trust Him with your life. Please, if you haven’t done it already, stop trying to save yourself and turn to Jesus to save you.
Then, when He has restored you, help others find restoration by pointing them to Jesus.
If you want to truly help people recover from failure, don’t condemn. Instead, let Jesus clean up your life first, and counsel only those who are open to it. In other words: lead with compassion, not condemnation; lead by example, not by examination; and lead with wisdom; not words.
To put it succinctly, see with the eyes of a doctor, not a judge.
Dr. Don Sunukjian, who was one of my professors in seminary, put it this way:
“Your company has a co-ed softball team that competes in the city league, and they're looking for a couple of extra players. You like softball. You like the feel of connecting on a pitch, running down a fly ball, making a clothesline throw on one hop to home plate to nail a runner trying to score. The first game is next Tuesday, and they're pushing you to join them.
But you're not sure. You like softball, but you don't know about playing with the people in the office. You went to a company picnic a couple of months ago, where there was a pickup softball game, and some of the guys were drinking a lot of beer, getting pretty raunchy in their comments about some of the women on the other team. Some of the wives of your coworkers were loud-mouthed, and they flirted with other husbands. The parents yelled mean things at their children but did nothing to control them. And in the parking lot, one of the married men from the office who had come to the picnic by himself was behind his pickup truck going at it pretty heavy with one of the single moms in the office.
Do you want to deal with all that every week? Should you join the team? Yes! By all means! Move into their world. Get to the park, shag those balls, and run those bases. Bring some Cokes to put in with their beers. When one of the women on the other team lines it into a gap between center and left for a stand-up double, instead of questioning her sexual preference, shout out, “Great hit! Did you play in college?” Buy a cheap glove for the single mom's kid, ask if he wants to be batboy, have him sit beside you on the bench, and teach him the strategies of the game.
Why move into their world? Because with the eyes of a doctor, you see their hurts that God can heal. You see that the machismo and the raunchiness merely disguise insecurity and failure. You see marriages where there's no love and children that don't have the security of boundaries. You see the single mom's loneliness and vulnerability that puts her at risk of being deeply hurt. With the eyes of a doctor, you see the hurts that God can heal.
In life we can have the eyes of a judge or we can have the eyes of a doctor. The eyes of a judge see a gothic girl, a deadbeat dad, and foul-mouthed [people], and leave us thinking, “Why have anything to do with them? The eyes of a doctor see the hurts that God can heal. (Donald Sunukjian, in the sermon “The Eyes of a Doctor,” www.PreachingToday.com)
Please, see people with the eyes of a doctor with hurts that God can heal, not with faults that you despise.
