Monday, 22 February 2010
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Should We Judge?
Lately I’ve been thinking about judging others. Now, Christians are often called very judgmental and the like. I think it’s a fair observation, except for the fact that the observant may be acting very judgmentally towards Christians.Often quoted Bible verse about judging is Luke 6v.37-38 : "Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven.” Matthew 7 has a similar version with some absent phrases from Luke. The context of the text is Jesus talking about loving enemies and being kind to those who wrong us.
The context here is important as I think it is speaking of salvation. Previously Jesus was talking about loving your enemies and why? We shouldn’t judge others because we do not know who is in the favor of the Lord and not. Love your enemies, pray for those who persecute you and furthermore do not judge whether people are saved or not. Jesus was asking for some tolerance from the Jews, not to look down on others that were struggling, but to lift up and invest in them.
Furthermore, I think what Jesus is highlighting most here is that there is a Pharisee in all of us. The Pharisee is the one that wants to see the speck in others while not seeing the log in himself. Jesus talks about this in subsequent verses. Using a concordance, the same word ‘krinete’ is used in Romans 2v.3:
“Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God?”
John Calvin remarks in his exposition of this passage:
This disease, in the first place, draws continually along with it the injustice of condemning any trivial fault, as if it had been a very heinous crime; and next breaks out into the insolent presumption of looking disdainfully at every action, and passing an unfavorable judgment on it, even when it might be viewed in a good light.
In fact, my Greek dictionary tells me that the word krinete in the Judaism context was that God judges and he alone. Jesus here is warning people not “to pronounce an opinion concerning right and wrong” (Strong’s) but to be gracious towards their enemies.
Nevertheless, I don’t think that this verse can be taken on its own. My other text I think is what I believe in, is the account from the Gospel according to John 7. It reads:
"I did one work, and you are all amazed," Jesus answered. "Consider this: Moses has given you circumcision —not that it comes from Moses but from the fathers —and you circumcise a man on the Sabbath. If a man receives circumcision on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses won't be broken, are you angry at Me because I made a man entirely well on the Sabbath? Stop judging according to outward appearances; rather judge according to righteous judgment."
The context to the last verse is important. Jesus is accused of performing a miracle on the Sabbath and the Pharisees have ground it into him. Then Jesus in the passage above turns the accusation around pointing out that the Pharisees themselves have been circumcising on the Sabbath.
Therefore the context of judge here is more concerned with hypocrisy. The Pharisees judged Jesus unfairly without considering themselves and their practices. I think that’s why non-Christians accuse Christians of being judgmental, they criticize others yet they do what they hate.
Christians are against homosexuality and yet they condemn them like they are lepers. Christians are against fake emotion and stealing yet they have TV networks like TBN (Whoops, did I say that?). Christians are against abortion, yet they do nothing to help those teenagers that decide to have a baby.
I think the image that comes to mind is from the TV show (forgive me) Glee. One of the main characters gets pregnant from a one night stand with another character. The implications from the show are that her parents are Christian because they have brought her to purity balls and promoted abstinence to her constantly. But her parents could not find it in themselves to forgive her for disobeying them.
Now, that’s a terrible indictment against Christians, if we can’t forgive others, how can we expect God to forgive us? Not to discount that the main character had done something wrong, she was certainly portrayed repentant and willing to correct her wrongs. How can we let our judgments cloud our unconditional love towards others?
Therefore, I think that making judgments is correct but only ultimately righteous judgments. God after all judges people: “But the LORD said to Samuel, "Do not look at his appearance or his stature, because I have rejected him. Man does not see what the LORD sees, for man sees what is visible, but the LORD sees the heart."
That is one of the many differences between us and God : we cannot see inside people. So I implore that Christians do not judge so readily, but only with great wisdom and discernment which comes from God. He gives us this wisdom because he is the one who is omniscient. Therefore, we cannot make objectively true judgments because we cannot see everything, yet we can make judgments which are beyond reasonable doubt, ie. eating rat poison will kill us.
I remember a real life situation in which I used to lead a Christian group at school. That was before it got overrun by Pentecostals and their "Devil music" and altar calls (just kidding!). One of the guys there used to really piss me off, like really badly, he was one of those skater dudes with 5 girls clinging to the fabric that clothed his body. If you know me I really hate skaters, my opinion is they are arrogant prats which the world would do better without. Anyway, I could ignore that, I was always polite and patient with him.
One day, he was especially pissing me off as he always was, being loud and obnoxious and mumbling about something or rather. He was disruptive and so I flipped at him, I absolutely flipped at him, which I have learned not to do very often. Again if you know me I have this bad habit of being extremely acerbic towards people I don’t like. No one knew that I held up so much resentment towards him. But I told him to sit down or piss off -- he picked the latter option. Someone told me later that his mum had cancer.
I felt so bad. Not excusing his behavior, but I knew that I had judged him without stepping into his shoes. I had slayed a mockingbird.
I hope that Christians would stop being so judgmental against everything that doesn’t fit with their idea of what a Christian should be. Maybe there is a bit of hope for skaters. Christians aren’t those that go to church every week and act properly but those who are chosen by God. I wish people would get that in their heads, going on protest rallies ain’t the only way to get people to make people listen. Being obnoxious and proud isn’t what a Christian is supposed to be, broken and humble is a statement louder than words.
I am never perfect, but I hope that people realize I try incredibly hard. Though I sometimes live a terrible testimony for God, they would not forget all the other times I have acted rightfully. I hope people know how hard I am trying, and forget how hard I fail sometimes. Above all, I hope that God doesn’t judge them too harshly but grants the grace that saves me from his condemnation.
PS. – Technically I am making unrighteous judgments against TBN as I have never actually seen TBN ever in my life…but I have seen the roster. Anything with Joel Osteen should be avoided at all costs.
Should we judge? Have you ever judged someone? How did you feel afterward?
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- From: llamalima@xanga
- About Me: Who am I? I am 19 year old university student, prone to stressing over about some assignment due the next day. I sometimes have time to blog mostly about Christian thoughts. In my spare time, I am also a musical connoisseur, ninja, movie junkie, and full-time hypochondriac. I may have lied about one of those, or a few.
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Comments (14)
If "not judging" someone means not being an unloving jerk toward them, sure. Don't judge.
But that's not what people usually mean when they say "don't judge me", or "who are we to judge?". What they usually mean is "don't make a distinction between right and wrong", which is bullcrap. I'm going to call a spade a spade. If someone talks about homosexuality, I'm going to say that it's wrong. If someone talks about getting pregnant outside of marriage, I'm going to say that it's a result of sin. But that doesn't mean I'm going to be a jerk to gay people, or that I'm going to not help a pregnant teenager to choose adoption instead of abortion.
We must be careful as Christians that "tolerance" doesn't start equaling us being quiet about our beliefs because we are afraid of offending people with our pointing out sin.
I think that was a pretty good analysis.
I think you make a good point and I agree with quite a bit of it overall, but here are some of my thoughts. Personally, I think it is more about "How do we judge?" than "Should we judge?" Ideally, it would be nice if we simply don't judge, but operationally, we will judge whether we like it or not. As long as there are morals, there will be judgment because there will be a motivation to do what we believe is right. Even if we do not intend to judge or believe that we shouldn't judge, our actions could certainly be interpreted as judgment. Beyond the social interaction of judgment, I also believe that judgment is compensated by a sense of righteousness. Therefore, when we judge, we are either not aware of it or feel justified in doing so. This is similar to how annoying it is when a person complains all the time, but when we complain, it is okay because in our minds, we have rational reasons to complain about our circumstances. You made a statement which I thought was interesting:
Therefore, I think that making judgments is correct but only ultimately righteous judgments.
This is either similar to what I was saying or contain some sort of contradiction, I don't know which. The exception, "but only ultimately righteous judgments," is extremely problematic for the reasons I mentioned before, because of our sense of self righteousness. This exception will become the rule because we believe our judgments to be moral, essentially changing nothing in terms of beliefs or action.
This is why I think it is more about "How do we judge?" than "Should we judge?" I believe that we will always judge, but we can judge a little more fairly if we give others the benefit of the doubt or look at things from a different perspective. Try to understand how people tend to judge, look at the different sides of the same coin and double standards. This is similar to your statement about our limitations in observation of others, but only God can see everything, but since I believe that we will always judge, this is the next best action.
Did I understand your points correctly? Do my points make sense?
@NightCometh@xanga - I agree.
We make judgements everyday. We must. You can not go through a day and not make a judgement about where to go, who to spend time with, if you want your child going into someone else's house, if it is safe to hire that babysitter, or ride in the car with that person, do we want to work for that particular boss? The list goes on.
if you ARE going to judge... at least make sure it's welcome. some people don't mind criticism.
the better issue should be: where does judgment get you? does the person you judge even care what you think? and how far does your judgment extend? tolerance isn't about liking everything... it's about realizing that, even though you don't like something, it's not your right to prevent others from doing it. most gay people i know really don't care if the "God Hates Fags" crowd ever goes away. what they care about are their rights, something that that crowd shouldn't have any say in.
@too_pretty_to_die@xanga - you are assuming judgement always means you say something. It doesn't. As a matter of fact, most judgement of other people and other situations take place in your mind and in your heart way more often than anything coming out of your mouth. Just because you haven't opened your mouth about something doesn't mean you aren't making a judgement. EVERYONE makes judgements of people, places and situations many, many times a day.
@sugartomyhoney@xanga - true. but even then, judgment is something that takes effort. why waste? whenever i catch myself, i ask the following questions:
1. am i judging the individual, or whatever stereotype i feel like he/she represents?
2. is judging useful to me somehow?
3. is it my place to judge?
if i answer "stereotype" to the first one, or "no" to the second or third, i focus my mind elsewhere.
I won't speak to what's wrong in the outside world unless it's not loving. If it's not loving then I will say something about it. But Jesus calls us to love our enemies not point out what the bible says about it.
p
BRAVO my friend!
This was an excellent read. This is refreshing to see that other Christians take the humility and grace route seriously. So many things came to mind when I read this post. First of all, when people don't forgive others, it's because deep down, they haven't forgiven themselves. I'm guilty as charged on this one. I have to really work on letting of the past sometimes and moving towards the future. I'm not nearly as hard on other people as I am on myself though. This post also brought to mind that Christians really need to allow for an immense space of compassion in their lives and self-forgiveness. This is a bit of Eastern philosophy kicking it but it is first and foremost Biblical. As Christians, we're held to such high standards and it's impossible to reach them most times. We all fall short of the glory of God. In fact, Moses was the only righteous man according to the Word. I also thought of a Scripture that I read in Isaiah 11:3-4: "He will not judge by what He sees with His eyes, or decide by what He hears with His ears; but with righteousness He will judge the needy, with justice He will give decisions for the poor of the Earth." Here, Isaiah prophesies about the coming judgment of Jesus Christ.
In sum, I think that it's important for all of us to lend ourselves some compassion. The end of this post was so moving when you said that you try every day and you hope that people recognize your effort more than your shortcoming. They made my heart lurch a little bit. I have the same sentiments most times. I pray some nights and I'm like God, if anyone were ever unworthy to call you Father, it's me. Luckily, His grace is more than sufficient. So if His grace is more than sufficient, and we are His children, our grace should be at least somewhat sufficient.
Keep on keeping on and go forward with compassion and grace.
Thank you so much for sharing,
EAB
@NightCometh@xanga - Very good point but should our path towards relating to God and others in a totally loving way consume so much of our time that there's a lot less opportunity to point on these things? I believe that our jobs as Christians is to bring people to the altar and let God handle the rest. It works best that way. Calling a spade a spade is absolutely necessary but it shouldn't be used as a weapon either. In your case, I don't think you're proposing that, but some people are incredibly callous and careless and they end up turning people away from the Church. Personally, I'll have enough on my rap sheet to account for in front of the pearly gates on Judgement Day. Far be it from me to add more by being a hypocrite, nasty, and jeopardizing someone's opportunity to spend eternity with God. Christians should convict and not condemn and by convict I mean with Godly wisdom only.
The english language is a versatile thing, for those who're calling for distinctions between judging and critisism I pull out my thesaurus for you;
Judgement: To cast specific titles or descriptions upon an object or person, to critisize or condemn, "In my judgement, this situation is very dangerous."...i.e. to form an opinion about a situation.
There is a fine line between looking at something or someone, and formulating how you see them...and casting your own definitions or critisisms upon a thing -- condemnation or allowation, for example. To some extent it's unavoidable, human beings must form opinions about the world around them, however...there is a line. "Do not presume to have the authority of God"...is what I've heard a preacher say before, and standardly I'd say that what everyone should remember...christian or not, is that we should all try to be tolerant and compassionate toward eachother.
@AlongTEH_Path@xanga - Compassion is the key. With the same weight that we judge one another so we will be judged. Nicely said.
Later in this same chapter in Matthew, Jesus is telling the disciples to beware of false prophets will come and that some trees will be corrupt. How can we know them and distinguish them, if we aren't making some sort of judgment? ...
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