Yesterday we raised two examples: the Pharisee and the unrepentant person on the cross. Both of these people have a common point, that is they like to judge others. As Christians, we should be careful to not judge others. When we find that we’re not humble or are poor in spirit, we tend to put our focus on others and not on ourselves. Therefore we have this tendency to judge others.

On the other hand, because we strive to be humble and poor in spirit and in addition to the Bible telling us to not judge, does that mean we cannot make judgements of others? If we find something unreasonable, should we not say anything? When we say something, does this mean we’ve judged? In our lives and in church and even in our workplaces, we find that people will judge others. The question is how do we discern? Can we judge others or not?

This idea of judging others in the Bible has a sense of passing a sentence of judgement that something is to be so. This can even be in the form of thoughts; it can refer to judging thoughts you have. It is not narrowed to just words you say. Just as how Jesus performed miracles, the Pharisees thought in their hearts, “What has this man done?” Even in our thoughts, sometimes we tend to judge others.

We turn to Matthew 7:1-6;

1 ‘“Judge not, that you be not judged.
2 For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you.
3 And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye?
4 Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me remove the speck from your eye’; and look, a plank is in your own eye?
5 Hypocrite! First remove the plank from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.
6 “Do not give what is holy to the dogs; nor cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you in pieces.’

In this passage Jesus talks about others. On one hand He tells us to “judge not” and the next is to flee from things unclean.

The first point tells us to remove the plank in our own eye before we help to remove the speck in our brother’s eyes. Jesus wants us to examine ourselves and not be busy with examining others. Only those who are humble and poor in spirit can do so.

People should be clear about themselves; they would know they have many weaknesses before God. If they’ve many weaknesses and they’re greater than those of others, how do they have the time to judge others instead of removing their weaknesses?

On the other hand, Jesus reminds us: why do we not measure ourselves with the measure we measure others? If we have greater problems than others, why don’t we solve ours first? If we don’t have the time to do that, how can we examine others? The difference in size between a speck and plank is very great. It’s an exaggerated comparison, but why don’t we see this?

It’s not that we’re not allowed to judge others. But when you judge others, please use the same measure to judge and examine yourself. This is the attitude we should have and this is only achievable when you’re humble and poor in spirit. Sometimes people don’t see others in a good light. When we see that someone is lacking aspect, we want to change that about them when this is also a bad habit we have. Do we exaggerate other’s faults but justify our weaknesses?

Paul gives us another concept in Romans 2:1;

‘Therefore you are inexcusable, O man, whoever you are who judge, for in whatever you judge another you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things. ‘

Paul was talking to the Jews back then because they like to judge others. Paul reminds them that no matter who they are, they cannot excuse themselves because while they judge others for their actions, they also are doing the same thing. This is often a blind spot. This can also happen between a couple who have already spent a long time being married. When one of the spouses cannot tolerate something the other party does, then they argue. They will then point out each other’s faults and justify their actions.

The Chinese have a very good saying, meaning that a young judge finds it hard to judge the domestic affairs of an elderly family. Both the husband and wife would have their good justifications because they both sound reasonable and justified.

When everyone’s emotion gets high, it is the time people are least reasonable. Their emotions take over their reasonability and they’re unable to see clearly. Only when you’re able to see yourself clearly then you can help others. This is not something easy to do.

If a parent sees that her child is not doing something right, then the responsibility of the parent is to educate the child. In the past, the parent would beat and scold the child. But later we realise that the child doesn’t change when we scold and hit him; instead the behaviour gets worse. Why is this so? Sometimes as parents, they may overlook their own weaknesses. On one hand they ask their child to do what’s wrong. If not, they’ll hit and scold. But ironically, the parents will display their weaknesses before their children. When their children see this and point it out, they’ll get scolded. In this case, the parents are unable to see the plank in their eyes but instead place their focus on the speck in their children’s eyes. How can you help them like this?

Only when we’re able to be humble and examine where we lack, then we can help. Only when you remove the plank in your eye, then you can help others. We’re not saying that because we’re now weak, we keep our silence when we see something unjust. When Jesus says to not judge in Matthew 7, it is to call out the hypocrites with the attitude of judging.

The Pharisees often judged people, raised themselves up and put down others. But Jesus is not saying that everyone is like this and He is not telling us to remove the wrongdoings of others. Jesus wants us to be able to differentiate and discern to make a correct judgement.

In Paul’s time, the church often had such happenings. We read Romans 14:4;

‘Who are you to judge another’s servant? To his own master he stands or falls. Indeed, he will be made to stand, for God is able to make him stand.’

10;

‘But why do you judge your brother? Or why do you show contempt for your brother? For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. ‘

13;

‘Therefore let us not judge one another anymore, but rather resolve this, not to put a stumbling block or a cause to fall in our brother’s way.’

When Paul wrote this letter to the Romans, why did he rebuke the believers there? This is because there was a dispute between the Jewish believers and those of other races. The Jews felt that even after believing in Jesus you still cannot eat things unclean. Others believe that after believing in Jesus all these are unnecessary. When different churches have their own perspective, some begin to judge others. V2 says;

‘For one believes he may eat all things, but he who is weak eats only vegetables. ‘

“One may eat all things”

The began to judge these people. In doing so, what problems aroused?

In the book of Romans, there are the problems of love and faith.

Paul rebuked those who lacked love. When they judged, they didn’t judge out of love. They believed their own faith is very great and asked the others to eat; they expect others to be like them. They didn’t realise these people’s faith were weaker. Although they had shown great acts of faith, they lacked love. Such a conduct may cause people to fall. Therefore Paul questioned them in v4;

‘Who are you to judge another’s servant? To his own master he stands or falls. Indeed, he will be made to stand, for God is able to make him stand.’

All these festivals or what to eat didn’t have much to do with salvation. It tells them to not force others to follow their way in doing things. In doing so, it’s like judging others. Paul tells them the One who judges is God; men cannot sit in God’s place to judge others. When Paul mentioned this, is he judging others? He wasn’t, he was simply pointing out the correct attitude in judging others. When you judge others, you must think of your motivation and your method.

How should we be humble to judge correctly and fairly? In 2 Corinthians 13:5;

‘Examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Do you not know yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you are disqualified. ‘

Paul tells the believers in Corinth to examine themselves; they cannot just look at the inadequacies of others.

There were believers in Corinth who like to scrutinised Paul and judged Paul for many things. However, their judgement were not with faith.

It’s not that Christians cannot judge people, but they must judge according to the truth. They cannot judge others unfairly or with evil intentions. If we understand this, then we can understand why there are places in the Bible where people are judging because these judgements are according to the truth.

For example, if someone in the church commits a sin unto death, then the church must have a judgement. We read 1 Corinthians 5:3;

‘For I indeed, as absent in body but present in spirit, have already judged (as though I were present) him who has so done this deed. ‘

What did he judge? In 1 Corinthians 5:1 tells us;

‘It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and such sexual immorality as is not even named among the Gentiles—that a man has his father’s wife! ‘

There was sexual immorality in the church and the people in the church didn’t find it a big deal. Paul rebuked them as being puffed up.

Paul says such people must be removed from the church if not everyone will do the same thing. If there’s no judgement, this church is gone! It’ll no longer be the church of God but Satan’s nest; you’ll do abominable things here. Hence, Paul judged that these people must be removed. When concerning matters of the truth, Paul was very strict (Paul rebuked Peter when he didn’t want to eat with gentiles even though Peter was an elder in the truth).

Regarding judgements which are unfair and shouldn’t be made, Paul has also reminded the believers in Corinth. We turn to 1 Corinthians 4:3-6;

3 ‘But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by a human court. In fact, I do not even judge myself.
4 For I know of nothing against myself, yet I am not justified by this; but He who judges me is the Lord.
5 Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord comes, who will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness and reveal the counsels of the hearts. Then each one’s praise will come from God.
6 Now these things, brethren, I have figuratively transferred to myself and Apollos for your sakes, that you may learn in us not to think beyond what is written, that none of you may be puffed up on behalf of one against the other. ‘

Paul wrote this to tell the people in Corinth to not judge God’s servants (But, It’s not to not judge even when His servants did wrong.) In chapter 3, they were judging which worker was better. In doing so caused many dissensions among the people. It caused many Temples to be destroyed and the church split. Paul reminded them if they destroyed the temple of God, God will destroy them. This is in 1 Corinthians 3:17;

‘If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are.’

Paul told them to not judge like this because this is not a teaching from the Bible. Even though there were people in the church who supported Paul, he didn’t endorse what they were saying about him. This is an act of his humility. Paul had his reasons for saying this; only God knows of the hidden matters in men’s heart. People’s perspectives are often limited and cannot encompass everything; it’s often biased. Only God can see all man’s motives. No one can escape God’s eyes. Even if we try to be humble, we must rely on God to help us.

Paul didn’t exalt himself because he was great. If he did so, he would have fallen into the trap because everyone is comparing between the workers. Men are likely to fall into such thinking without realising it. A person who is humble like Paul doesn’t cast an unreasonable judgement of others and is attentive of himself; he’ll first examine himself.

One weakness of men is that they like to judge others but don’t like being judged.

Both of these things require wisdom. Why is it easy for us to judge others but so difficult to judge ourselves? If we think about this, reasonably speaking we know ourselves best and should know what we’re lacking. But when we lack this heart of humility, we often overlook our own weaknesses. To understand ourselves is also not easy.

Conversely, we think it’s easy to judge others but it’s actually difficult. Because all of us are limited; we only see one side of things. With a little bit of information, we begin to judge others. This is how people become judge-y. We cannot immediately judge when someone isn’t good on first impression.

There was a sister and a brother. The sister was very wealthy and the brother was also quite well-off. But the brother would always ask his sister to treat him to a meal; it’s always the sister paying the bill. The sister thought, “Why is he taking advantage of me?” and got unhappy.

One day, she realised that he always helps others. Whatever money he has, he’ll help the poor. Then, his sister realised that his younger brother isn’t that bad. If she didn’t know of this, she’d think that her brother was trying to take advantage of her.

Jesus feels very strongly about this. In John 8:15;

‘You judge according to the flesh; I judge no one. ‘

When Jesus came to the earth, the Jews couldn’t accept that He was the messiah. From His external appearance, they didn’t believe so. The Jews said that though Jesus was only 30 years old, He looked like He was 50. When Jesus was born as a carpenter’s son, many Jews couldn’t accept Him. They judged Him by His external appearance.

When Jesus showed His power to heal, they also couldn’t accept Him. Men are like this; they value outward appearance more than internal appearance. Men tend to judge based on outward appearance. This is very dangerous; inevitably everyone has weaknesses. We may often be mistaken. Sometimes we may be self-righteous to believe too much in ourselves that we’re correct; we’re biased towards our own actions. This can cause negative consequences. When such judgements happen, it may be awkward when people see each other.

Judging people may create unnecessary misunderstandings.
The speaker was in Thailand. After a sermon, a believer stood up and was very unhappy, “Why are you talking about me!”

He thought the preacher was pointing him out. The speaker wasn’t speaking about this person but he thought he was. (It takes a lot of effort to prepare a sermon, why would the speaker spend so much time to prepare a sermon for just one person?) When you listen to a sermon, you have to listen to it with a humble spirit. If you listen to a sermon and you find that you’re indeed lacking something, you should humbly seek for God to help you change yourselves and overcome your own weaknesses. If you hear it and get angry, often it is a problem. If not, you wouldn’t be angry. Because whatever is being said is from the Bible. Instead, you’ll tell yourself to be careful to not fall into such weaknesses.

A person who is humble will be ready to accept criticism because they’ll feel strongly about it; if what they hear is correct they’ll find it beneficial. They won’t think someone is judging them. Other people’s criticisms help us grow.

We shouldn’t see all kinds of judgement in a negative way. Some people have very high self-esteem, “So you say I’m not good? I’ll prove you wrong!” This is not good for the person. It’s not that you’ve realised your own weaknesses to make this change, you just want to prove a person wrong. This way, you’re exalting yourself. If you’re like this, it’s hard for you to understand your good and bad points.

Having too high of a self-esteem is also not good. You may be jealous of others easily and may not accept the good suggestions of others but instead attack them. If you’re too full of yourself it’ll be very hard to work with you.

Even when working outside, you’ll often meet people who will judge you. But are we humble enough to accept criticism or are we too proud to?

In conclusion, we read Luke 7:33-35;

33 ‘For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, ‘He has a demon.’
34 The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Look, a glutton and a winebibber, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’
35 But wisdom is justified by all her children.”’

Here Jesus says that “wisdom is justified by all her children”.

John the Baptist didn’t eat bread or drink wine; the people said there’s a demon in him. When Jesus came, He ate, drank and befriended sinners but they still judged Him. This tells us we need to have wisdom to discern. Only when we’re humble, we can have good judgment. We have to be careful and examine ourselves. Then, we’ll be able to make good judgements. If we have such wisdom, we’ll be able to remove the plank in our own eye and help our brother remove the speck in his eye.