This is a great passage about not judging others. I think judgment is something most people struggle with. I know I do, along with a lot of other girls my age. I felt very convicted when I read this today. I love when Jesus convicts me with His Word. It’s the first step in the process of letting God change my heart as I am trying to become more like Christ. I wanted to share this with you today in the hopes that it would impact you like it impacts me.
Matthew 7:1-6
7 “Do not judge others, and you will not be judged. 2 For you will be treated as you treat others. The standard you use in judging is the standard by which you will be judged.
3 “And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own?4 How can you think of saying to your friend, ‘Let me help you get rid of that speck in your eye,’ when you can’t see past the log in your own eye? 5 Hypocrite! First get rid of the log in your own eye; then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your friend’s eye.
6 “Don’t waste what is holy on people who are unholy. Don’t throw your pearls to pigs! They will trample the pearls, then turn and attack you.
I always seem to need to be reminded that it is not my job to judge others. As hard as I try not to, I feel like judgement surrounds us in our culture today. It’s a natural response for us, because it’s what everyone does. As Christians, sometimes we get the feeling that we are better than other people who don’t share our faith in Christ. It’s sad, though, that what we are known for as Christians is our judgement of others. Instead, shouldn’t we be known for our joy in Christ and our love for others? For non-christians looking in, there wouldn’t be much incentive to be a part of something where there is so much judgment. We judge our brothers and sisters in Christ all the time! Why would someone want to come join us, only to be judged by us? Love is a stronger witness than hate every time. As followers of Christ, we are called to respond out of love rather than out of hypocritical judgment.
The scary part is that we will be judged in the same manor that we judge others! I’m not perfect. I have made a lot of mistakes in my life, and I certainly don’t need to increase the strictness of the judgement on myself. But also, what right do I have to judge when I am no better than the people I judge? I am a sinner. Anything good I do is only possible through Christ. Therefore, I have no right to brag about my good deeds.
Something to be aware of, however, is that Jesus is speaking about the type of hypocritical, judgmental attitude that tears others down in order to build ourselves up. We are not called to simply overlook all wrong behavior. We need to be holding each other accountable as brothers and sisters in Christ. If I have a fault that I don’t notice about myself, I would want a fellow believer to lovingly point it out to me. Jesus calls us to expose false prophets (Matthew 7:15-23), and Paul calls us to exercise church discipline (1 Corinthians 5:1-2). We must make sure the right motives are behind our actions. Everything we do should be done out of love for God and love for people.
Now let’s look at verse 6. It seems a little out of place to me compared to the rest of the passage. I was confused by it, so I looked it up in a commentary. Bible commentaries help me out a lot when I don’t understand something. Basically what I learned about this verse is that pigs were “unclean” animals according to the Law of the Old Testament. Jesus is saying that we should not entrust holy teachings to people who won’t listen and just want to tear apart what we say. This is a hard concept for me to grasp, because we are also supposed to reach out to those who don’t know Christ. What I learned from this verse is that we should not stop giving God’s Word to unbelievers, but we should be wise and discerning in our witnessing so that we will not be wasting our time.
All in all, I got a lot out of this passage. It made me realize that God still has a lot of work to do on my heart. What did God teach you as you were reading this passage? In what ways do you need to become more like Christ?
Tagged: Bible, Christ, Christianity, convicting, daily dose of scripture, followers of christ, God, God's word, Gospel, great passage, holy, hypocrite, Jesus, joy, judging others, Love, Mattew 7, matthew, scripture, Spirituality
