JUDGE NOT (09-10-10)

Luke 6:42
You hypocrite! Remove the wooden beam from your eye first; then you will see clearly to remove the splinter in your brother's eye.
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A wooden beam versus a splinter. What a big difference in terms of size. This is because Jesus wants to emphasize the fact that most of the time, those who judge others are far guiltier of doing something wrong than the person he is judging. And most of the time also, he judges wrongly that could only lead to misunderstanding among friends.

The act of judgment is an act of pride. Judging others is an act of monumental pride - enormous pride, stupendous pride, galling, astonishing, fantastic pride. When you render judgment on another, you have taken upon yourself an awesome responsibility for making the correct judgment.

And still we cannot turn away from judging someone, even those we do not even know. It gives us extreme pleasure to poke fun at someone, especially when those around us will laugh with us. And we take that as an approval, and so we repeat and repeat and repeat this loathsome deed.

On Judgment Day, your deeds will be the evidence of your faith, verifying whether or not you truly believed in Christ with living faith. His judgment is what will give your life its true and ultimate significance. The judgment you made will ultimately judge you.

Judge Him to be your Savior and receive God’s judgment on your sins in His death on the cross. Judge Him to be your Lord and receive God’s judgment of your eternal acceptance in His resurrection. And accept your judgment in Heaven.

Let us pray +

Almighty Father, teach me not to be judgmental of others so I may not be judged in return by no other than You. How we live our lives before You and following Your desires, is the only thing that matters. It is the only true measure of how I will be judged when I come face-to-face with You in heaven. In the end, may your mercy judge me positively so I may finally join You eternally in heaven. Amen +

How lovely is your dwelling place, Lord, mighty God!