The Sand Pile of an Unjudged Life

Be sure and join us today via the internet for our concluding services of this week. 9:30 AM -- Dr. Roger Willmore, and please note 6:30 PM with Dr. Bob Alderman -- www.americaskeswick.org

THE SAND PILE OF AN UNJUDGED LIFE Part Three

"...then shall you see clearly to cast out the mote out of your brother's eye." (Matthew 7:5)

If we are going to be the faithful Christian servant and friend that sees clearly how to assist a friend in removing problems from his or her life, we must first be the open and honest person who has understood the value and process of a self-judged life. We must also value the benefit of being properly judged by others. Little wonder our Lord was so explicit about this matter in that helpful and well-known "Sermon On The Mount."

Our culture has taught us to avoid judgment, not only of others but also of ourselves. Our culture is wrong. Jesus taught the opposite. Our culture has abused the process. Jesus accented clearly the proper process and the proper purpose.

A part of the process of such proper judgment, whether of ourselves or of another, is the use of a proper standard. As our Lord prepared us for the exercise of proper judgment, He warned us about the matter of a proper standard.
"For with what judgment you judge, you shall be judged..." (Matthew 7:2)

Nobody likes to be judged by an incorrect and improper standard. Neither should we presume to judge others or ourselves by such inferiority. To that point Christ puts a very clear warning. Before I ask others to judge me I would like to make sure that they have applied the same standard of judgment to themselves. Only then can I find confidence, security and compassion in their willingness to assist in my needs.

So we must set a high standard for ourselves before we can effectively assist others. A society that sets a low standard of judgment will produce a low-standard culture. The same is true of friends - and parents and pastors and politicians and professors.

Perhaps the problem we have had in the twentieth century is not that we have failed to judge but rather that we have failed to adopt our Lord's standard for proper self-judgment. In doing so we have become destructively judgmental. That is not what our Lord had in mind when He set the guidelines for corrective and protective judgment. Dr. Robert L. Alderman is minister-at-large of Shenandoah Baptist Church, Roanoke, VA.

God's WORD for YOU: Psalm 107-109; Proverbs 21; 1 Corinthians 4

Great Quote: When He lays hold of us, He comes like the angel that came to Peter in prison in the dark and awoke him out of his sleep and said, "Rise! And follow me." It is only when we get out into the street, and have been with Him for awhile, and the daylight begins to stream in, that we see clearly the face of our Deliverer, and know Him for all that He is... It is the knowledge of experience. It is the knowledge of love, it is the knowledge of union, and it is in order that we may know Christ that He lays His hand upon us. -- Alexander MacLaren