INTRODUCTION
• Can you tell me the one verse in the bible everyone seems to have memorized?
• How many times have we just taken a look at another person and made a judgment about them. We take one look at them and we think that we know everything about them?
• What about the times when we find out a person has done something and we sit back and think how terrible the person is when all the while we forget about what we have done?
• It is so easy to look around us and make judgments about people while we conveniently forget about our own struggles. It reminds me of a story told by Kathy Plate of Orlando Florida. She said, “While visiting a neighbor, five-year-old Andrew pulled out his kindergarten class picture and immediately began describing each classmate.”This is Robert; he hits everyone. This is Stephen. He never listens to the teacher. This is Mark. He chases us and is very noisy." Pointing to his own picture, Andrew commented, "And this is me. I’m just sitting here minding my own business."
• We are most always the one who is just sitting there minding our own business.
• Have you ever felt the sting of being unfairly judged by another person when they did not even know you?
• I want us to spend our time together today looking at what Jesus has to say about judgment.
• During Jesus day the religious leaders had a tendency to judge a person by their social standing or their race. We do not do this today do we?
• Jesus makes an interesting shift in thought going from encouraging us to rely on God for our needs to a prohibition against being judging others.
• This passage is one that many people quote, but few people really understand or want to understand what Jesus is forbidding us to do.
• What I want to do this morning is to first look at what Jesus really means when He tells us not to judge others, and then I want to take us from there to some steps that Jesus gives to us to help keep us from breaking His command.
SERMON
I. EXAMINING THE COMMAND. (V 1&6)
A. There are three possible meanings of the word “judge”. In order to be able to do what Matthew 7:1 says. We must understand which of the meanings Jesus intends for this passage.
• Judge as in a person who sits in a court room.
• To discern.
• To condemn.
1. Judge as in a court?
• Civil court judgments are not prohibited.
• In Titus 3:1 we are told to be subject to our rulers and Romans 13 says that government is ordained by God.
• Church discipline.
• In Matthew 18:16, a judgment is required to know if church discipline is needed to be exercised. In Titus 3:10 a character evaluation is needed in order to determine if a person is a factious (a person who causes division) person. In 2 Thessalonians 3:6 we are told to determine if a person is leading an unruly life. In 2 John 1:10 we are told to make a judgment concerning the teaching of another person.
• Is this what Jesus is condemning? Apparently not since we are given instances where this judicial type of judgment is used.
2. Discernment?
• MATTHEW 7:6 “Do not give what is holy to dogs, and do not throw your pearls before swine, or they will trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces.
• A person who is discerning is one who will look at the whole situation and make an evaluation based on the facts of the matter.
• Notice that Jesus within the same chapter that He tells us not to judge, tells us not to cast our pearls before the swine or give what is holy to dogs? How do we decide who are swine and dogs according to this passage if we are forbidden to make a fair evaluation?
• In Matthew 7:16-20, Jesus tells us that by our fruits we will be known. Matthew 7:20 says, “So then, you will know them by their fruits.
• How will you know someone by their fruits unless you use some discernment?
• Is Jesus condemning making a well thought out evaluation of someone? No because within the context of this passage, particularly verse 6, we are told to be discerning.
3. Condemning judgment?
• READ ROMANS 14:1-4.
• We are not to just snub our nose at other people or make a judgment based on the fact that someone may not do something like we would or if they are not at the same level of understanding about things are we think we are at a particular time.
• For some reason, it is easier to jump to negative conclusions about people than it is to assume the best about them. When we do this, we ascribe to them bad intentions and evil purposes that may not be true. We also reveal something about ourselves, for the faults we see in others are actually a reflection of our own.
• What Jesus is prohibiting is hypocritical, unloving condemning judgment on our part.
• Luke 7:37, “Do not judge, and you will not be judged; and do not condemn, and you will not be condemned; pardon, and you will be pardoned.
• Jesus is not telling us that we are not to examine another persons fruits (actions) and then make an evaluation, but we are not to pronounce a final judgment upon them.
• As Christians we do want to be guilty of a “critical spirit”, or condemning judgments. The word from which we get the English word “critic” is the same word that Jesus uses here when He tells us not to judge others.
• We need a way to defend ourselves from being critical of people. It is easy for Satan to get us to be critical, therefore losing perspective of how Jesus wants us to deal with people.
• Jesus tells us that if we judge with a critical spirit that God will do the same for us.
Transitional Sentence: Now that we understand what Jesus is really telling us, we will now consider a couple of DEFENSES that Jesus gives to protect us from having a Critical Spirit.
II. EVALUATE THE YOUR STANDARD (read verse 2)
A. What Standard are we going to use?
• READ ROMANS 2:1-4
• Are we going to use bitterness? Are we going to use mercy?
• Are we going to compare other people to us?
• How many times do we just look at a person and make a judgment about them.
• In 1884 a young man died, and after the funeral his grieving parents decided to establish a memorial to him. With that in mind, they met with Charles Eliot, president of Harvard University. Eliot received the modest looking couple into his office and asked what he could do. After they expressed their desire to fund a memorial, Eliot impatiently said, “Perhaps you have in mind a scholarship.” We are thinking of something more substantial than that… perhaps a building.” The woman replied. In a patronizing tone, Eliot brushed aside the idea as being too expensive and the couple departed. Then the next year, Eliot learned that this plain pair had gone elsewhere and established a $26 million memorial named Leland Stanford Junior University, better known today as Stanford.
B. Our standard will be used against us.
• One of the reasons that we need to evaluate the standard that we use is that Jesus said that the standard we choose to use on others will be used against us!
• If we are able to use Jesus as our standard, then we find that we are not even that perfect!
• LUKE 6:38 "Give, and it will be given to you. They will pour into your lap a good measure pressed down, shaken together, and running over. For by your standard of measure it will be measured to you in return."
• How many different things do we use to judge people? Do we want Jesus uses those standards against us when we stand before Him?
• Romans 2:4 told us that God’s tolerance, patience, and kindness leads to repentance or changes in our lives.
• What we want from God is mercy! What we need from God is mercy! If we want and need mercy, then we need to use that standard when we are evaluating other people.
III. EXAMINE YOUR OWN LIFE. (V3-5)
READ MATTHEW 7:3-5.
A. Clean up your own act! This will help keep our motives pure.
1. GAL 6:1 Brethren, even if anyone is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness; each one looking to yourself, so that you too will not be tempted.
2. In 2 SAMUEL 12:1-7 Nathan the prophet went to confront David about his sin with Bathsheba. Nathan told him the following story. (READ 2 Samuel 12:1-7) David’s sin blinded him to truth, and mercy.
3. If we are blind, then we will miss lead people.
i. LUKE 6:39-40 And He also spoke a parable to them: "A blind man cannot guide a blind man, can he? Will they not both fall into a pit? A pupil is not above his teacher; but everyone, after he has been fully trained, will be like his teacher.
ii. In Matthew 15:14, Jesus called the Pharisees blind guides because they thought that they were so holy, they could not properly discern things.
iii. Faults are like the headlights of a car; those of others seem more glaring than your own.
B. How often we overlook our own failures and sins while criticizing the faults in others! In fact, our judgment may reflect our own flaws, which usually are more serious than those we see in someone else.
a. A woman named Ruth Knowlton told how she came to see this truth. The building across the alley was only a few feet away, and she could easily look into her neighbor’s apartment. Ruth had never met the woman who lived there, but she could see her as she sewed and read each afternoon. After several months, she noticed that the figure by the window had become indistinct. She couldn’t understand why the woman didn’t wash her windows. One sunny day Ruth decided to do some housecleaning, including washing her own windows. Later that day, she sat down to rest by the window. To her amazement, she could clearly and distinctly see her neighbor sitting by her window. Ruth said to herself, "Well, finally she washed her windows!" By now you’ve guessed what really happened: Ruth’s own windows were the ones that needed washing.
IV. EXERCISE BALANCE IN YOUR EVALUATION OF OTHERS (5B-6)
• Jesus finishes out this section on judgment by telling us to exercise balance when we are evaluation other people.
• We are not to go to extremes. We are forbidden to judge hypocritically or without love. On the other extreme, we are not to turn our heads to everything that is going on around us.
• We are to have a balance of humility, conviction and love. We are to be a person who loves Jesus and is willing to admit and mourn over our own sins. We must balance that with being wise to what is going on around us. Jesus said in Matthew 10:16, "Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves; so be shrewd as serpents and innocent as doves.
• Jesus tells us “Do not give what is holy to dogs, and do not throw your pearls before swine.” To obey that command it is obviously necessary to be able to determine who are dogs and swine.
• Jesus is telling us that we have to determine if we are wasting our efforts on some people. That does not mean that we give up on them, but that we instead use the energy and zeal that we are using toward the people who does not seem to care anything about Jesus and spend that on another. Then we pray that God will send someone else along to reach the person who we are not making headway with.
CONCLUSION
• Don’t let people keep you from discerning. But remember when we are judging what other people are doing make sure that we are not exhibiting a critical spirit towards them lest God do the same with us.
• I do not want to have God nick pick me to death because no one else would get to make it through the judgment line.
• We are not to be critical in our spirit, but we are to be merciful toward other people. There will be times when we will have to make a judgment, but if we evaluate our standard, our life and motive, it will help keep us from making critical judgments against people. If we do not make judgments, then we will not be able to help people.
• When you we try to lovingly tell people that if they do not change their life and give it over to Jesus, they will not go to heaven don’t let them use this passage as a way to make you feel that you have no right to tell them that.
• The next time we are ready to be judge, jury and executioner of another, remember that God will use the same standard against us.
• Let us look for the best in people. Let us be a people who look to bring out the best in people. Let us be a people who do not right off people.
• The next time you are ready to play the critical spirit card on someone, ask yourself, “Is this how I want to be judged?
• Jesus loves you and wants you to be with Him for eternity!
