“Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. 38
Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” 39
He also told them this parable: “Can the blind lead the blind? Will they not both fall into a pit? 40
The student is not above the teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be like their teacher. 41
“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 42
How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when you yourself fail to see the plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from
your brother’s eye.
I have previously made an argument for what I think is the most well known and most often quoted verse in the Bible. What do you think is the most widely used? But
here is the catch; the most widely used verse by those who are not Christians or who are only marginally associated with the church? I guess one could make a case for John 3:16 although many, possibly most, outside the church couldn’t quote that verse accurately.
In fact, many people who could NOT quote John 3:16 could, have and do quote the one that begins out text this morning!
Luke 6:37 or its companion, Matthew 7:1 has to be one of the most quoted verses in all the Bible, and concurrently, the most misunderstood, abused and perverted text
of the Bible. These words of Jesus are often found on the lips of some of the most unexpected people, being wielded like a sword, played like a trump card, thought to win the day every time they are spoken. This is especially true when speaking to a Christian
as if to say, “Ah-ha! Got you now! And got you at your own game with your own book!”
What is Jesus really telling us? Our Savior in his words from his Sermon on the Mount, draws a pointed contrast between His kingdom, and the life that follows Him,
and that which the religious teachers of his day were setting forth. We listen as Jesus puts together things like, happiness, blessedness, reward, and rejoicing, with the very kind of things, the very kind of experiences in which we are least likely to
think we would find happiness, blessedness, reward and rejoicing. We are taken to the supernatural life of the disciple…A life that understands cutting off the right arm and gouging out the right eye. A life that understands our calling to mercy, kindness,
and love, not only to those who love us, but even extended, our life poured out, toward those who hate us. There is no rule book for this, there is no check list of exactly what we have to do and don’t have to do in order to follow the command of our Savior
to live this other worldly life of love. We are left dumbfounded. Standing in our tracks, mouths gaping open, wondering, “O Lord, how can I do this, how can I live this way?”
This morning our text picks up right there, in the same context of love’s calling, love’s radical nature and we are told, “Judge not, and you shall not be judged.”
Our Lord is not calling us to suspend our critical faculties in relation to other people, nor to turn a blind eye to the faults and weaknesses of men, as if we did not notice them.
He is not asking us to refuse to discern what is true and what is false, what is good and what is evil, what is faithful and what is unfaithful, we are required to
do these things. We know this for a number of reasons. First, to ignore the truth would be hypocritical and we know from Jesus’ example and words of his hatred for the sin of hypocrisy. Jesus does not ignore sin, or pretend it is not there. He does not think
that time heals all wounds, and that sin will eventually just go away if you ignore it. Jesus deals with sin and so must we, both in our own hearts and in the covenant community.
Second, much of Jesus’ teaching, even in the Sermon on the Mount, and here in Luke, is based on the assumption that we will and should use our critical powers,
for example:
*We are called to live differently than the world around us, this of course implies that the world is NOT living as they should, in submission to God and by faith,
and we pass that judgment in righteousness and seek to live in an opposite manner.
*Jesus has made it a point to say that the righteousness of the Pharisees is not true righteousness and that ours must exceed theirs if we are to enter the kingdom,
this too requires judgment.
*He calls us to be aware of false teachers and to make judgments that they are false and are in fact enemies of the gospel.
*We are called to judge the fruit that is produced in the lives of men and to make judgment on the man by the fruit in his life.
*The church is called to judge those who profess faith by holding up the standard of covenant faithfulness and if there is unrepentant unfaithful behavior to cast
the one in such a condition out of the church. This is a judgment.
*We teach our children that bad company corrupts good behavior and expect them to be able to make judgment upon that which constitutes bad company.
*Jesus will tell us that if we observe our brother in sin, we should go to him and show him his fault. We are to, literally with great humility, face our brother with
his sin!
This could go on and on, and perhaps we are acquainted with what Jesus does NOT mean. But we are still left asking the question, what DOES Jesus mean? What is he
referring to?
Jesus is not here intending to free people from criticism but to lay upon us a sacred obligation. As one writer so aptly put it, “What Jesus is speaking of is censoriousness.”
As Christians, we are supposed to be critical, we test the spirits, we judge fruit and the church exercises the use of the keys of the kingdom, but we are not censorious.
Censoriousness is a sin that gathers around it many pieces to make it whole. Its desire is not to assess people critically, or to lovingly laugh together at the oddities
that make them who they are, but to judge them harshly.
The censorious critic is a fault-finder, a blamer, one who is negative and destructive towards other people and enjoys actively seeking out their failings, hoping
the worst, while at the same time ignoring or making little of his own failures and sins. He puts the worst possible construction on the motives of others, as if he knows the hearts of other people. He is always speaking to what others were thinking
and feeling and WHY they did what they did or why they did NOT do what they should have. He pours cold water on their plans and is ungenerous towards their mistakes. This is the critical spirit that sets self over its brothers and fellow man as if he is THE
competent one not remembering his place before God.
Now, when we hear a definition like this, it is easy for us to nod our heads and to see clearly why this is destructive and wrong. It is also easy for us when hearing
a cold, sterile definition to be thankful that this in no way touches our lives that we are not like this and it is here that we make our mistakes, and possibly a fatal one.
The Lord’s example of the speck in your neighbor’s eye and the plank in your own, is a caricature You can almost see in your mind the cartoon like drawing of this
huge two by four sticking out of a man’s face, while he attempts to find the speck in the eye of another. It is absurd, and it is absurd on purpose. Remember, there IS a speck in the eye, that is not the issue, the error is not in the diagnosis, but in the
failure to apply to oneself, the criticism that is so quickly and easily applied to another!
The Lord is making us aware of something and it is not a small something, for it is true of every one of us and it is this: We are naturally super sensitive to the
faults of others and just as naturally insensitive to our own. We over and over again, exaggerate the faults of others and minimize our own. We are harder on others, but easier on ourselves. We have one standard for people we love, another for ourselves
and still another for those who, truth told, we don’t love, or don’t care for as much. Francis Schaffer used to say that the Lord would need to do nothing more to condemn us all a thousand times over than to simply hang a tape recorder around our necks, and
then hold us to the same standard according to which we had condemned others.
We make judgments without knowledge, without love, without mercy and without the necessity of even needing to make the judgment. AND, to make it worse, we are not
all that slow in sharing our judgments made on someone with other people. This is nothing but pride, pride exalting itself, and nothing more. It is hypocrisy because our pride actually parades itself in this fashion either as kindness toward the person whose
faults we are pointing out, after all we are only trying to help them…Or we are only trying to help others to whom we are gossiping that THEY beware of this trap that so and so fell into…or this pride masquerades as our own passion for truth and righteousness.
Brothers and sisters, this is ugly. This is unbecoming of us all who bear the mark of the grace and mercy of God in Jesus upon our souls.
This is exactly what verses 35-36 of chapter 6 tell us and our text intimates such things when Luke repeats the words of our Savior, “forgive and you shall be forgiven.”
This is the heart of the Christian, generosity in judgment and a lightning quickness to forgive, why? Because we know what it is to be forgiven. We know our own sin, and failings, for they parade by us in daily fashion, in thought, word and deed. But we have
come to One who has shown such mercy, such grace and love, that He has forgiven us all of these our sins, all our failings, whose judgment of us is made in love, grace and mercy. And if you are a recipient of this grace, the Lord says it will be evident in
this very fact, that you are quick to forgive as you have been forgiven. Quick to show mercy, because of the mercy you have been shown. Quick to make charitable judgments, hoping the best, because that is what the Gospel is and what the Gospel has worked for
you. If we are not these things, if we do not forgive, then we are not forgiven, because we prove that although the gospel is connected to us by some outward, external manner, it does not own us, it has not taken hold of our heart.
This is the end of this morning’s devotion. If you want you can skip to the prayer and hymn. However, I am compelled to tell a story that happened in
Tacoma at Faith Presbyterian Church, my home church. It is rather long, but very inspiring. It combines all matters that we have been speaking about these past days. Love, but not just for our brothers and those easy to love. Giving, with no expectation to
get anything back. Mercy, without a judgmental, censorious spirit and the Lord’s miracle of new life. Churches, and ours is no exception, often get ‘cold calls’ from folks who want money, food, a gas card, that type of thing. Sadly, in my experience, the folks
are not as forthcoming as one would hope. More than once, I have been taken in by a false story. It is hard to keep a right spirit in your heart, to be generous, remembering the Lord’s mercy to you, when folks are lying and trying to “get away” with something.
This happened at my home church in Tacoma, even more than it does here. Here is a letter the deacons received after helping a woman.
“Dear Faith Presbyterian Church,
My name is Amy Hartin. I came to your church for financial assistance about 4 years ago. At the time I was a member of the Baha’i faith and had been sober for
about 9 months. I came to meet with the deacons and I made it quite clear that I had no intention or even interest in becoming a Christian. I thought that because of this they would surely turn me down and turn me away. But that is most certainly not what
happened. They agreed to pay my rent in full. I was amazed and thought surely this was the greatest gift from God. The Lord had worked through them and allowed me to stay in my house.
However, four years later I realized that that, was not the greatest gift I received that night. Before I left them, they gave me a Bible. A Bible that stayed
on the shelf for three years. When I picked that book up after so long, I read what they had written in the cover, “Amy, please read John chapter 3, page 921, and John 14:6, page 936, then keep going. May you know the joy of sin forgiven by the Lord Jesus.”
I have to tell you that from the moment I picked it up after three years my life began to change. I read my Bible daily. I want you to know that your generosity
and love has guided me to a place in my life and a relationship with God that I never could have imagined. I have found a wonderful church here in Minnesota and have had the wonderful opportunity to help in Sunday School. And I will be baptized on February
15th. I wanted to share this with you as your church has been so instrumental in this transformation. Again, I want to thank you for sharing God’s grace with me.
In Amy’s testimony to her church, which she included in writing, she concluded this way:
“Today, even though it has taken four years, the love shown by that church has led me to the belief that Jesus is my Lord and Savior. He died on the cross for me and not only for me but for all of us. I am truly forgiven and truly loved by God and I gotta
say there was a time when I didn’t know that. He has made me whole. He continues to speak to me through the Bible and through His spirit and all I have to do is listen.
The deacons of that church were not naïve, they were not lacking understanding of the way men are and the lengths men will go to, to get what they want. But their
judgment was one of mercy…it was one of desire to show the love of God, to be put out, to give with no expectation of getting anything back. But what they did get back was that which far exceeds anything this world could ever pretend to give. They were instruments
in the hand of God, for life, tools whose hearts were ready and willing to be used in mercy, and therefore the reason for angels rejoicing in heaven.
There is simply no room in the Christian life, in the Christian church, for a censorious spirit. There is no room for a demanding, critical spirit that demands everything
to look a certain way, MY way, the way I think things should look. This critical spirit is the enemy of the gospel, it is the enemy of mercy and grace, and it infects and spreads like a cancer with only one desire, to destroy and to tear down…To destroy and
tear down the church, and your own soul. Everywhere you see this critical spirit in you, every thought that runs by and every word that escapes your mouth, must be taken and slain, killed, mortified, for it speaks not to life, but to death. A church, a people
that lives without this spirit…will shine like a light in the darkness!
Prayer: Father, I plead with you to wash my heart, my mind and my words. I have sinned times without number in being ungracious and censorious toward those You
have called me to love, and to serve with a humble and cheerful heart. Lord, may I love others with my thoughts, words and actions the way my Savior has and continues to love me! Give me this heart! Give me this mind! Fill my heart and mouth with words, seasoned
with grace to the good of others and to the glory of my God, through Jesus Christ my Lord, Amen.
Hymn: John Rutter’s arrangement of Psalm 23. Simply beautiful!