Matthew 7:1-5
Have any of you ever made a mistake before? This week I found some pretty interesting times when people made big mistakes.
Mike Grady played third base for the New York Giants in 1895. In one played he (1) muffed a routine grounder, (2) overthrew first-base, (3) dropped the ball when the first baseman finally recovered the overthrown ball and threw it to him to catch the advancing runner, and (4) promptly threw the ball over the catcher’s head as the runner raced for home. What should have been routine ground ball for an easy out ended up being a home run for the opposing team.
Be careful if your King James Bible was printed in 1716. That particular year the printer mad a flagrant mistake. In John 5:14, the final copy read “sin on more” rather than “sin no more.” That must have been a good year for bible sales, because it seems like a lot of people are still heeding the advice of that old edition.
A businessman wanted to send a floral arrangement to a friend who was opening a new branch office. His friend called later in the day to thank him for the considerate gesture but was a little confused about the accompanying card which read, “Rest in Peace.” The businessman apologized for the mix-up and quickly called to chastise the florist. The florist tried to console the executive. He said, “That’s nothing. Somewhere in the cemetery there’s a bouquet with a note reading. “Good luck in your new location.”
Throughout Christian history it is obvious that people have made mistakes on their interpretations of scripture. Now I certainly don’t claim to be right on everything but I feel that the verse that we are going to speak about today is the most misunderstood verse in the bible - or you might say the verse with the most mistakes made in the interpretation of it.
Matthew 7:1-5
“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brothers’ 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? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brothers’ eye.”
If there is one verse in the bible that almost every non-Christian knows it is this one. In fact, many people say that this verse has overcome John 3:16 as the most popular verse in the bible. The reason is because so many people in the non-Christian community are using it as sort of a trump card. Something that you can pull out of your back pocket when you feel like your morality is being threatened.
For instance if a Christian was to approach a non-Christian with their particular sin many would quickly pull out their card - don’t judge.
There was a Boston TV talk show that featured homosexual teenagers talking about their life-styles. One even professed faith. When asked if he felt there was a conflict he said, “No, my God is a God of love. He accepts me just the way I am. Other people shouldn’t judge me!”
If God intended for this verse to be used like that then we have a great contradiction on our hands because many of the gospel writers actually tell us how to judge.
Examples of biblical judging
Paul - I Corinthians 5:1-2 - “It is actually reported that there is sexually immorality among you, and of a kind that does not occur even among pagans: A man has his father’s wife. And you are proud! Shouldn’t you rather have been filled with grief and have put out of your fellowship the man who did this? In verse 11 Paul even says - “But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat.” At the end of verse 13 Paul says to “expel with wicket man from among you.”
Paul - I Timothy 5:19 - “Do not entertain an accusation against an elder unless it is brought by two or three witnesses. Those who sin are to be rebuked publicly, so that the others may take warning.”
Paul - II Timothy 3:16 - “All scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training and righteousness.
John - I John 4:1 - “Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.”
Jesus - Matthew 7:15 - “Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. By their fruit you will recognize them.”
You see, if we are to take Jesus’ statement in Matthew 7:1 as just a broad blanket as saying “don’t notice and bring up someone else’s failings then Jesus would have just contradicted himself in Matthew 7.
How can you notice false prophets unless you make a judgment call based on what he is saying?
Going back to John 4 where John says to test the spirits, well, we couldn’t do that because we would just have to hear and believe what the spirits say. We would have no right to contradict them because what they say is at least right to them if it’s not right to us.
About the elders - how could you make an accusation against an elder unless you made a judgment?
The biggest one of all though goes back to I Corinthians 5. If a man in the church sleeps with his mother or other sins like he mentioned such as being greedy, a drunk, or someone who takes advantage of people then that’s just really none of our business. We have no right to judge.
Something just seems to be incorrect about taking Jesus command in Matthew 7 at face value. If you take it just as what we have hear then the answer to the question, is it Ok to judge is NO. We let everyone do their own thing even if they are sinning. If that were true then Jesus and many of the gospel writers like John and Paul would contradict Jesus. So I believe that it is a mistake to take this verse at face value.
So what is it then? What is this verse saying? What is the correct interpretation of this verse? What does Jesus really want us to hear?
I think that Jesus gives us a good example in John 8 of what he is talking about.
Read Matthew 8:1-11
I know of an elder who was the exactly like these people. Anytime someone sinned badly he wanted to bring them up in front of the church.
He might have meant it for good but it was a time to throw stones.
I think that this is the perfect example. Did you notice what did and didn’t do in this story?
1) He didn’t condemn this lady. He wasn’t rough with her. He didn’t tell her that she was going to hell.
2) What he did do with a firm but gentle hand was tell her that she was sinning and that she needed to leave her life of sin.
You see Jesus do that many times throughout the gospels - Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
In fact just four chapters earlier in John 4 with the woman at the well there is a woman that has been married 5 husbands and the man she was with at the time wasn’t even her husband. Jesus is very gentle with her but not afraid to bring up her sins and let her know what she is doing is wrong.
John 3:17
“For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world but to save the world through him.”
Jesus did not come to be critical of people but to show them the way that they are supposed to be living. There would be another time for an ultimate judgment and this was not the time. The same is true of us. One of the duties of a Christian is not to condemn the world, say who is going to heaven and who is going to hell, but to show people the way that they are supposed to live.
Make no mistake about it - as Christians we are to be a moral voice in the world. We are salt and light.
Quote
-----“God calls us to get in the game, not to keep the score.”
You see, I believe that judging is OK. We just need to make sure that we have the correct attitude when it comes to judging.
Attitude #1 - Be careful how critical you are!
Verse 1-2
“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”
Now one thing that caught my attention with these verses is if you take the face value that we talked about earlier this verse makes absolutely no sense.
That would suggest that if we judge other people then we will be judged. So then that must also mean that if we don’t judge people then we won’t be judged.
Romans 14:10-11
“You, then, why do you judge your brother? Or why do you look down on your brother? For we will all stand before God’s judgment sea. It is written: “As surely as I live,” says the Lord, “Every knee will bow before me; every tongue will confess to God.”
Philippians 2
“every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.”
II Corinthians 5:10
“For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.”
Hebrews 9:27
“…Man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment.”
From these verses you can see that by not judging people you don’t get a free ticket out of having to go through judgment.
Instead what this is speaking about is warning us to be careful because in the same way that we are critical of people God will be critical of us. If we are rough on people on this earth then God will be rough on us at the judgment. So it is very important that we are careful about the judgments that we make.
One man said - “For every action, there is an equal and opposite criticism.” - I don’t like that very much but I know that it is true. There are some people who are just more critical then others. We can find something wrong with anything - the really scary part though is when we can find something wrong with anyone.
Let me caution you to make sure that your judgments are accurate and not just simple criticism of something that you don’t like.
One of the most famous sermons ever preached was titled - “Sinners in the hands of an angry God.” Don’t you be that sinner because of a critical nature. Don’t you blow this off. Make no mistake - God is love but he is also a God of justice.
“With the measure you use it will be measured to you!”
Attitude #2 - Examine Your Own Life First
In 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.”
Verse 3-5
Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brothers’ 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? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brothers’ eye.”
These verse should quickly remind you of a story back in the Old Testament.
According to II Samuel 11
It was in the spring, when kings go off to war. Only this spring David stayed in Jerusalem.
One evening David got up during the night and went walking on the roof of his palace.
From his roof he saw Bathsheba bathing. David sent his messengers to get her and he slept with her. She became pregnant.
David has Uriah come home so that he could go home. You know so that he could sleep with his wife and seem as if the baby came from Uriah. He was so honorable though that he slept on the steps of the palace because he figured that the other men were fighting so how could he have such a privilege.
So David came up with another plan. He gave Uriah a note to give to the general that he should be put on the front line where the fighting in the fiercest and when the battle gets heavy pull back and leave Uriah alone. (Remember - Uriah is the one that has to carry the letter of his own death.)
Uriah ended up dying and the Bible says Bathsheba mourned his death but then David took her home to be his wife.
The Bible also says that this great displeased the Lord.
II Samuel picks up by saying the Lord sent Nathan to David. (II Samuel 12:1-7)
“There were two men in a certain town, one rich and the other poor. The rich man had a very large number of sheep and cattle, but the poor man had nothing except one little ewe lamb he had bought. He raised it, and it grew up with him and his children. It shared his food, drank from his cup and even slept in his arms. It was like a daughter to him. Now a traveler came to the rich man, but the rich man refrained from taking one of his own sheep or cattle to prepare a meal for the traveler who had come to him. Instead, he took the ewe lamb that belonged to the poor man and prepared it for the one who had come to him.” David burned with anger against the man and said to Nathan, “As surely as the Lord, lives, the man who did this deserves to die! He must pay for that lamb four times over, because he did such a thing and had no pity” Then Nathan said to David, “You are the man!
Do you understand the point of the story? It is very easy to be critical of other people when all the time the problem or a problem lies within us.
It is much easier to be critical of someone else instead of us.
What I have found with judging though is that most of the time the things that we are critical of others about is the very thing that we aren’t good at.
Edgar Dunlap was an attorney who, years ago, served on the Board of Education in Gainesville, Georgia. While touring an elementary school one day, he saw a boy carving his initials on a desk. Dunlap shouted for the boy to stop. “What’s the matter with you kids today? When I was in school, none of the boys dared to deface public property like this!” A few days later the chastised boy stumbled upon an old desk in the school basement. Carved on the top of the desk was the date 1905 and six names. The six-name list began with none other than Ed Dunlap. The old attorney took the desk top with him and mounted it on his office wall. He said, “I keep that there to remind me to be more tolerant about the things kids do.”
We need to look at ourselves first to see if there is something wrong with us. Believe me, if makes it all that much easier to not only see the other person fault but to deal with it in a loving and caring way.
Your attitude of judging will be so much better if you first deal with your own problems. Judge yourself before you judge someone else.
Attitude #3 - Understand the reason for judging
I will say that sometimes judging is to be done somewhat harshly. God has never taken lightly to people within his church who continue to live a sinful lifestyle.
Achan
Ananias and Sapphira
But for the most part judging should be done with the intent to restore.
The word brother appears 3 times in our short section of scripture today. That tells me that this is someone that needs to be restored. Someone that has left home and needs to know that the door is always open to come back.
Judging should always be done with…
1) a loving heart instead of a critical heart
2) a gentle nature instead of a condemning nature
3) a firm hand but not a striking hand
4) a warm embrace instead of a cold distance
Judging done in that way is the kind of judging that God desires and expects.
