The Super Bowl is known as much for its commercials as it is for football, and Super Bowl XXXIX was no different. Ameriquest Mortgage Company sponsored two ads. One had a man coming home with a bag of groceries and a bouquet of flowers. He begins dinner by starting a pot of spaghetti sauce. As it simmers, he quickly sets the table where he has placed candles and arranges the flowers. He wants to do something really nice for his wife. But as he cuts up vegetables with a large knife, their furry white cat gets on top of the counter and tips over the pan full of red sauce, landing on the floor in the middle of it. The poor guy picks up the cat dripping with bloody-red sauce with one hand while still holding the large knife in the other — just as his wife walks in the door. At that point the commercial flashes the sign: “Don’t judge too quickly. We won’t”
The second commercial Ameriquest aired had a man talking on a cell phone as he enters a convenience store. He is talking to a friend and says, “Well, that’s a lot of money for a deck.” He picks up a drink and goes to the counter as he says, “I hate to tell you this but you are getting robbed.” The owner of the store is behind the counter with his back turned, and when he hears what the man is saying he looks into the security mirror just as the man puts his hand inside his jacket and tells his friend again, “Did you hear me? You’re getting robbed.” At that point the store owner spins around and sprays him in the eyes with mace. The man’s wife runs out and shocks him with a cattle prod as her husband proceeds to wale on him with a baseball bat. As the man lies dazed on the floor, the words appear: “Don’t judge too quickly. We won’t.”
The ads are extremely popular for a couple of reasons. First, because they are so humorous and creative, but secondly, because they strike a chord within everyone who has been judged hastily and unfairly. The interesting thing about the commercials is that the people in the ads who made a false judgment did not hear what happened from others, they knew they saw what they saw, and heard what they heard. The wife saw what happened with her own eyes. The store owner heard the words with his own ears, but both were wrong. They weren’t going by hearsay, but they were still very wrong in their interpretation of the events. It never occurred to them that they could be mistaken.
Jesus’ teaching, which we have read today, is designed to keep us from making those kinds of mistakes. I think there are important lessons here for us to learn. The first is this: Don’t condemn others. It is very easy to demonize people we disagree with, or whose lifestyle does not match up to our personal standards. It is very easy to think that someone will never change or that there is no hope for them. We consider them too far gone.
There were no hopeless people according to Jesus. If someone was sick, he believed they could be well. If someone was dead, he believed they could live. If someone was sinful, he believed they could be forgiven and live a new life. Jesus said, “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven” (Luke 6:36-37). It is this element of condemnation that makes judging others so egregious. People who condemn are those who condemn the person as well as the action. They focus on the faults of others and never focus on self-examination.
The warning, of course, is that if we judge others we will be judged — both by God and others. Those who are always critical and demanding of other people cannot live up to their own standards, and that does not go by unnoticed by other people. But our primary concern is not what people think of us, but what God thinks of us and what will happen to us at the judgment. The merciful will be shown mercy. Those who judged others harshly will be harshly judged. Those who were always picking at the wrongs of others will have their errors picked at. But those who exuded mercy in their attitude and dealings with others will be shown great mercy. Jesus said, “For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you” (Matthew 7:2). Humility is called for in our walk with God and our relationships with others.
Of course, one of the big problems in our evaluation of other people is that we see their faults so clearly, and are so blind to our own. I love the way Jesus uses humor and hyperbole here to show us how ridiculous we can be. He talks of a person who notices a speck of sawdust in someone’s eye and becomes very concerned about it, insisting that it be removed. But all the while, they are walking around with a log the size of a barn beam sticking out of their eye — and do not seem to notice. Isn’t that the way it is? Those who are the most critical seem to be the ones with the most glaring faults. They drive you crazy with their compulsive harsh criticism and guilting, and never seem to feel they do anything wrong. They use a magnifying glass when looking for the faults of others, but wear blinders when it comes to looking for their own. They ridicule, mock and treat others with contempt. Their remarks are always pejorative. They are always tearing others down. This was the way of the Pharisees who fiercely criticized Jesus for healing on the holy day of the Sabbath, when they were plotting to murder him — and planning it on the Sabbath no less. Talk about the sawdust and the log
This is why Jesus warns us about being judgmental, because we can all be so blind to our own faults. Paul wrote, “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 seat. . . . So then, each of us will give an account of himself to God. Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another” (Romans 14:10, 12). In other words, let God worry about it. You know, no one is ultimately going to get by with anything. All of us will stand before the true Judge of all the earth and give an account for what we have done and how we have lived. The Bible says, “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” (2 Corinthians 5:10). You don’t have to worry about it; God will take care of it.
The second lesson I believe Jesus is teaching us is: Don’t rush to judgment. I remember a time when my cat got in the spaghetti sauce. I haven’t told many people about this because it is too embarrassing. But one day when I was a young pastor, I was visiting the hospital. As I left the hospital and was heading to my car in the parking lot, I saw a young nurse whom I had counseled concerning her marital problems. I asked her how she was doing and she began describing her latest difficulties. It was winter and a freezing wind was blowing. I invited her to sit in the car because of the cold and because it became obvious that this was going to take awhile. As we sat in the car, she came to the end of what she had to say and then to my utter bewilderment she laid her head on my chest. At that very moment a couple from my church walked by the front of the car on the way to see their family member whom I had just visited. It was one of the most awkward moments of my life.
I have always been grateful that those folks never mentioned the situation and I never heard anything about any rumors going around in the church. I hope the reason that they never said anything is that they trusted me and gave me the benefit of the doubt — which would have been a huge exercise in grace since it was something they saw with their own eyes. But that is the key to not jumping to conclusions — having a sense of trust and giving people the benefit of the doubt. Jesus said, “Stop judging by mere appearances, and make a right judgment” (John 7:24). Always take into consideration that you may not have all the facts. Understand that there are people who want you to side with them so badly that they will try to convince you of things that may not necessarily be accurate. Sometimes people believe things because they want to believe them, and they will want you to believe them as well. There are those who assume the worst without thoroughly investigating a matter, but Jesus is asking us not to rush to judgment and to assume to best — even if we can’t imagine another explanation at the moment.
A third lesson Jesus teaches here is: Do use discernment. It is very important that this point comes last. We are to be generous in mercy and reserve judgment as much as possible. We overlook each other’s faults, imperfections and failings. We love each other in spite of misunderstandings, disagreements and disappointments. Don’t allow yourself to get into the habit of being critical; develop a heart that is generous in your opinion of others. Give them space. Don’t expect perfection. This is especially true when it comes to matters about which sincere Christians disagree. For instance, in New Testament times there was serious disagreement among Christians about whether it was right to eat meat offered to idols or not. A sharp division arose because some saw it as sacrilegious, and others saw all food as a gift from God. And since the gods to whom the food was sacrificed did not exist and were no gods at all, they had no conscience against it. The same kind of thing is true today. We are not to judge other Christians who, in good conscience, see some things differently than we do. Some believe certain things are wrong and others see nothing wrong with those things. Paul wrote: “The man who eats everything must not look down on him who does not, and the man who does not eat everything must not condemn the man who does, for God has accepted him” (Romans 14:3).
Having said that, this does not mean that we do not exercise any kind of discernment whatsoever. There is a moral standard. Some things are obviously wrong. The Scripture is clear about certain kinds of moral behavior. To ignore these things, once the facts have been established, would be foolish. I find it interesting that we often quote Romans 2:1 which says, “You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge the other, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things” (Romans 2:1). But Paul writes those words in the beginning of the second chapter of Romans, after he has just spent the entire first chapter of Romans condemning the sins of idolatry, sexual impurity and perversion, greed and depravity. He talked about people who were: “gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless” (Romans 1:29-31). All of this is followed by the admonition not to judge others, so obviously, he had something different in mind than never having an opinion about right and wrong. He is not asking us to throw our brains out and be completely unthinking in our approach to other people and their behavior.
Likewise Jesus. At the end of the sentences about not judging, he confuses us with these words: “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” (Matthew 7:6). If you offer a dog communion he will not recognize that it is sacred. If you give pigs pearls, they will not understand their value, in fact, they will trample them into the mud. The dog might even turn on you and give you a terrible bite. Jesus was saying that some people are like that. They don’t understand what is sacred, nor do they respect it. Quoting the Bible to them might get you a black eye, and if you talk to them about morals they might tear you to pieces. Others will treat your Christian experience with contempt — like having it trampled in the mud. These people are ignorant of spiritual things and do not understand sacred things of eternal value. To recognize that is not being censorious or judgmental, it is proper discernment. You have to use your head.
Someone wrote: “Jesus’ statement, ‘Do not judge,’ is against the kind of hypocritical, judgmental attitude that tears others down in order to build oneself up. It is not a blanket statement against all critical thinking, but a call to be discerning rather than negative.”
Paul admonished his churches to exercise church discipline, and in order to do that they had to have a healthy ability to discern between right and wrong, good and evil. He wrote to the Corinthians concerning a man with a moral problem in the church saying, “What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. Expel the wicked man from among you” (1 Corinthians 5:12-13). It sounds harsh until you understand what it would mean to ignore that kind of behavior. We don’t expect the people in the world to act any differently than they do. We expect that from the world, but we don’t expect that in the church. People who are supposed to belong to Christ should act differently. To some that is judging in the wrong sense. They cry foul. “Who are you to judge me?” they say. Some even claim that since they live by grace and not the law, it does not matter what they do.
But what kind of people would we be if a child or someone else was being abused, and we overlooked what was being done to them, because we were afraid of being judgmental? Is that love? What kind of people would we be if someone was continuing to be unfaithful to their spouse and we threw up our hands and said that it is not up to us to judge? What kind of church would we be if some people who were leaders in the church were living in obvious immorality, and we ignored it and continued to allow them to lead without expecting them to be an example? What kind of parent would you be if your child was hurting someone, or involved in something harmful or illegal and you overlooked it? It is important to see these things and confront people about them, but when we do this the goal is always restoration. We want them to be restored in their relationship with God and others. So some kind of judgment or discernment is necessary. Don’t go to the extreme of being so non-judgmental that you lack good judgment altogether.
The church also needs to judge between what is correct doctrine and wrong teaching. The Bible warns: “The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. Such teachings come through hypocritical liars, whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron” (1 Timothy 4:1-2). Some people who failed to have proper judgment have been seduced into cults and teachings that have led them away from Christ.
We have to practice good judgment, otherwise Jesus would not have said, “Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them” (Matthew 7:19-20). There is a delicate, and sometimes difficult, balance between using good judgment and being judgmental — and all of us fall into judgmentalism at times. That is why we have to stay near Christ. That is why we constantly inspect our own lives. That is why we constantly pray.
In his book Mere Christianity, C. S. Lewis helps us gain balance when he says, “If anyone thinks that Christians regard unchastity (sexual sin) as the supreme vice, he is quite wrong. The sins of the flesh are bad, but they are the least bad of all sins. All the worst pleasures are purely spiritual. The pleasure of putting other people in the wrong, of bossing and patronizing and spoiling sport, and backbiting; the pleasures of power, of hatred. For there are two things inside me. . . they are the animal self and the diabolical self; and the diabolical self is the worst of the two. That is why a cold self-righteous prig who goes regularly to church may be far nearer to hell than a prostitute.” Then he adds, “But of course it is better to be neither ”
Rodney J. Buchanan
April 24, 2005
Mulberry St. UMC
Mount Vernon, OH
www.MulberryUMC.org
Rod.Buchanan@MulberryUMC.org
Do Not Judge
(Questions for April 24, 2005)
1. Share an experience where you have been unfairly judged, or a time when you have unfairly judged someone else.
2. Read Luke 6:36-37. What does it mean to be merciful?
3. Read Matthew 7:2. When you read this verse, what thoughts occur to you?
4. Read Luke 7:36-49. Who was being judgmental in the story? What were his actions like? Who was not judgmental? What was her life like? Who was forgiven?
5. Read John 7:24. Why is it easy to jump to judgment, and how can we avoid this?
6. Read Matthew 7:6. How does this verse fit in with the previous verses?
7. What is good judgment? Why is this important?
8. Read 1 Corinthians 5:12-13. How can we be non-judgmental and do this?
9. What would the church look like if we never used any judgment?
10. How does self-inspection relate to the whole subject of using judgment?
