Questions Jesus Asked:
Of Specks And Planks
Bible Reading:
Matthew 7: 1-5
PREPARED BY
KEN GEHRELS
PASTOR
CALVIN CHRISTIAN REFORMED CHURCH
NEPEAN, ONTARIO
Questions, questions, questions - always, it seems, another question.
That’s how it is when you have young children in the house.
Again and again:
"Mommy, why is the sky blue?"
"Daddy, how come cows don’t fly?"
"Why does spinach have to be good for you?"
That’s how young children learn - by asking questions.
That’s also a great way to get people to learn - by asking them questions.
Make them stop and think.
That’s how it is that Jesus dispensed much wisdom and issued many challenges.
Again and again.
Including the question we wish to consider today, Matthew 7:3-4:
"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? 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?....."
A question tossed our way surrounded by the echo, "Do not judge, or you too will be judged....", famous words that just about everyone has heard at one time or another; words that we often have at the ready as some sort of verbal fly swatter when someone challenges us on particular behaviour or thought patterns –
"back,
get back,
don’t bug me,
you can’t judge me ‘cause Jesus said so!"
Happy sounds those are in a day and age when the only politically correct response to any moral statement or lifestyle is, "Who am I to judge? If it works for them....."
So, let’s be clear that this is the farthest thing from Christ’s mind as He tosses the challenging question in the direction of His hearers. Simple fact is, the Bible is chock full of divine calls that expect judgement to take place, including just a few verses later in this chapter of Matthew:
Matt. 7:15-20 tells us that Christians are to judge prophets and teachers by the fruit that their lives bear.
Rom 13 tells us that Government agencies have a rightful judging role in society
1 Cor. 5 tells us that the Church is properly to discern and judge lifestyle patterns, naming sin for what it is and struggling against it.
In fact, what drives Jesus to ask the question in the first place, to include it in His famous Sermon on the Mount, is not the action of judging, but the attitude that lies behind so much of the activity of judging which occurs among us.
He’s not saying, "There’s no room for judgement at all in the Kingdom of Heaven."
Rather, He’s saying, "Think very carefully, count to ten, and have a long and careful look in the mirror before you entertain the idea of judging.
Stop, look and listen.....
at your own life
before you think about looking at the life of someone else.
Jesus doesn’t condemn correction; He doesn’t squash the moral arena of judgement. They remain necessary elements of human living.
What he condemns;
what he rebukes;
what he warns against in such extravagant terms is
critique and judgement of others that occurs in a context removed from a deep awareness of our own fallibility and sin-stained character.
What He desires for us is that we lay aside our hammer of judgement that is so ready to smash others, and come to them as fellow sinners, as pilgrims longing to see the other one healed where they are broken and well aware that we need healing too.
As the ancient church father, Chrysostom noted,
"Correct him, but not as a foe, nor as an adversary exacting a penalty, but as a physician providing medicines."
A physician also in need of medicine.
What Jesus confronts with a question in this chapter of Matthew is precisely the same attitude that He confronts with a challenge in John 8 as He says to Pharisees who stand ready to stone the adulterous woman:
"Let him who is without sin cast the first stone."
What Jesus calls us to develop is the attitude he prays for:
"forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors...." (Mt 6:12)
How are we doing in this regard?
Well, consider this -
Many people are spiritually hungry and searching. Poll after poll reveals this. And yet those same research stats also paint a picture of people who discount the option provided by the Christian Church. It’s simply a non-starter with most spiritually searching people today.
Why?
Because so often we are seen as the condemning ones; judgmental ones; hateful ones; narrow ones. Church is seen as the people that are against, rather than for.
In this regard -- where there’s smoke, there’s fire.
Society sees Christians as the ones who criticize the moral laxity of youth, graffitti and irresponsibility and the like..... easy to do. Much harder to lay down the time, effort and bucks to develop appropriate alternatives for them.
It’s very easy to condemn the young woman who has an abortion. It’s much harder to critically examine social structures that leave large numbers of Canadian children and single mothers in a welfare trap and drive many to the abortuary.
It’s not hard to condemn self-centredness in society. Much more difficult to develop an open attitude beginning right here in one’s own church family where one makes deliberate room and welcome for others in one’s own life.
Our spiritual heritage is shackled down in this regard, I’m afraid. A look back into our church history shows that we are a people of judgement and schism. 1857 - the birth of the CRC, born because of suspicion and mistrust of other Reformed believers who weren’t very well known. More splitting in the 1880’s. Again in the 1920’s. And the ‘40’s. The 80’s. The ‘90’s.
Lest we begin to judge them, consider the dynamics within our home congregation - Barrhaven, Calvin, Kanata. Can we truly say that we, as congregations, are one? Are we free from a group spirit that divides us into little pockets which eye each other with a bit of suspicion and mistrust, that live in virtual isolation from each other other than cohabiting the same room on a Sunday morning? What’s the conversation like when we gather after church as friends? Or when we’re driving home from church?
Ever notice how much bigger the irritants are in the life of your spouse than they are in yours? I mean, after all, there is a good reason for why you’ve not bothered with this or that or continue to do...... But your spouse. I mean, my goodness, you’d think that by now he’d have......
Or with your friends - the way they dress, the music they listen to, the way they stand. "Excuse me? What do you mean me??"
What Jesus names through a question is something very close to home, brothers and sisters. God is speaking directly to us.
In one edition of the"Peanuts" comic strip, Linus asks Lucy, "Why are you always so anxious to criticize me?" She answers, "I just think I have a knack for seeing other people’s faults." "What about your own faults?" asks Linus. Her response is, "I have a knack for overlooking them."
-- Robert C. Shannon, 1000 Windows, (Cincinnati, Ohio: Standard Publishing Company, 1997)
Yes.
Us, too, Lucy!
Jesus tosses out a question about specks and planks.
It’s not that specks are inconsequential. If you’ve ever had a bit of sawdust in your eye, a piece of drywall stipple, whatever, then you know how much it can smart. Ouch. These irritants need to be removed before they begin to cause possible long term damage.
But a whole plank?? That’s not just an irritant. Get hung up on one of those suckers and you become blind. "Plank in eye" syndrome doesn’t let you see a single thing. Worse than that, walking around with that item dangling off your face will tend to knock other people over, or trip you up.
When people have spiritual "plank in eye" syndrome they lose all sense of perspective. They become blinded. It happens so easily, you know.
We become blinded by prejudice - preconceived notions about old folks, or young, or folk who look like or dress like or work at......
We become blinded by personality; wanting to saddle up to this person or that family, or avoid them because they’re like....
We become blinded by probably the biggest "P" word: power. I remain convinced that most of the splits in the history of the Christian Reformed Church, and most of the conflict that continues today has very little to do with theology or practice and very much to do with power. Control. Of the organization - its direction, its norms, its practice, its look and feel. Of people, even and how they structure their lives. Power - we feel secure when we’ve got it, and uneasy when we don’t, so we grab for it. And from the self-imposed "king of the hill, top of the heap" position we quickly label, pigeon-hole, criticize and even condemn others.
So it is that in this whole area of judgement and critique we find one place that Jesus actually sanctions a "me first" mentality; gathering before the cross "me first" and praying:
Lord, begin the process of correction, reproof and training with me.
Lord, judge me - my actions, my thinking, my speaking.
Lord, shape me - my relationships, my priorities.
Lord, cleanse me - make me holy, make me like Jesus.
It comes down to something that Grandma always said -
Son, remember, when you’re pointin’ a finger at someone else, there are three other fingers, tucked inside, pointin’ right back at you!
I can’t remember if I first heard this story from James Dobson or Tony Campolo. Been a long time. Apparently true. Came across it again this week.
It’s about Teddy Stallard, who by his own admission was an unattractive, unmotivated little boy; one of those that teachers find difficult to like and easy to judge as "the problem child." Teddy was a source of great frustration for his fifth-grade teacher, Miss Thompson, who all day long faced his deadpan, unfocused stare.
Although she said she loved all her students, Miss Thompson had to admit that deep down, she didn’t like Teddy. She even received a certain pleasure in marking his papers with red ink and writing big F’s on them. She judged Teddy.
However, as his teacher, she had his records, and she knew more about him than she wanted to admit:
First Grade: "Teddy shows promise with his work and attitude, but he has a poor home situation."
Second Grade: "Teddy could do better. Mother is seriously ill. He receives little help at home."
Third Grade: "Teddy is a good boy but is too serious. He is a slow learner. His mother died this year."
Fourth Grade: "Teddy is very slow but well behaved. His father shows no interest."
At Christmas, Miss Thompson’s class all brought her pretty gifts, and gathered round to watch her open them. She was surprised when she received a gift from Teddy -- crudely wrapped in brown paper and tape. When she opened it, out fell a gaudy rhinestone bracelet with half the stones missing and a bottle of cheap perfume.
The other children began to giggle, but she had enough sense to put on the bracelet and apply some of the perfume to her wrist. She asked the class, "Doesn’t it smell lovely?"
When school was over and the other children had left, Teddy lingered behind. He slowly came over to her desk and said softly, "Miss Thompson, you smell just like my mother. And her bracelet looks real pretty on you, too. I’m glad you liked my presents."
When Teddy left, Miss Thompson got down on her knees and asked God to forgive her.
The next day when the children came to school, they were welcomed by a new teacher. Miss Thompson’s eye plank was gone, and she had been given a new vision to see how to help, by the grace of God.
By the end of that school year, Teddy showed dramatic improvement and had caught up with most of the students.
After that she did not hear from Teddy for a long time. Then one day she received a note that said: "Dear Miss Thompson: I wanted you to be the first to know. I will be graduating second in my class. Love, Teddy Stallard."
Four years later, she received another note: "Dear Miss Thompson: They just told me I will be graduating first in my class. I wanted you to be the first to know. The university has not been easy, but I liked it. Love, Teddy Stallard."
Finally, she received another note: "Dear Miss Thompson: As of today, I am Theodore Stallard, M.D. How about that? I wanted you to be the first to know. I am getting married next month, the 27th to be exact. I want you to come and sit where my mother would sit if she were alive. You are the only family I have now; Dad died last year. Love, Teddy Stallard."
Miss Thompson went to that wedding. God had removed the log in her eye, given her clear vision, and by his Spirit in her had done something for Teddy that changed his life forever.
And all of this happened because one Christian stopped leaping to judge and looked to heal.
It’s a huge story in a little life.
Not every situation is near that dramatic.
But the moments present themselves to all of us.
And the challenge is equally large.
The call from Jesus equally true.
As we gather under the cross - can we respond?
