“For I am not aware of anything against myself, but I am not thereby acquitted. It is the Lord who judges me. Therefore do not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart. Then each one will receive his commendation from God.” 1 Corinthians 4:4-5 (ESV)
Dr. David Jeremiah just put this really cool pamphlet out called “Tour of Duty”. It is all done up in an olive green cover holding beige pages with just the right amount of gold leafing. Kind of like a USMC Gomer Pyle feel to it with the marching orders for today’s Christian Solider (I borrowed some of that sentence from him). It starts off with the lyrics to “Onward Christian Soldiers” and then you turn the page to see…GOD WANTS YOU! Dr. Jeremiah even ends his introduction with “Be all God wants you to be”, pretty cool stuff to read in this pamphlet. It is like having one of his sermons right at your fingertips.
As I paged through these freshly printed marching orders I get to marching order #4. This is a tough one as I have been in a period of time where what Dr. Jeremiah has written is very relevant. It is about judging others and why we, as Christian Soldiers, are to refrain from doing this. The five verse references given are all “Red Lettered.” This tells me that The Judge has laid down the ground rules on how His people are to judge each other. So without any further ado let’s get into the list of the five verse’s.
1. “Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.” (John 7:24 ESV)
This means to respect those things we are not sure of like people’s motives and environments. To judge things according to the truth, the evidence of them and to understand that only God can judge the hearts of all men.
2. “Or how can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when there is the log in your own eye?” (Matthew 7:4 ESV) How can you look your brother in the face and say something about their struggle if you have the same struggle that you cannot deal with yourself? Our own judgmental spirit tends to criticize others in our own areas of weakness and we suddenly turn into lumberjacks to avoid the absolute judgment of Holy Spirit conviction.
3. "Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you.” (Matthew 7:1-2 ESV) This means to be weary of rash judgments concerning a brother’s word or his deeds even to the point of handing down a sentence with respect to their eternal state. A man who lived before Christ whose name is Hillell (possibly the father of Simeon…Luke 2:25) gave this as advice, “Do not judge your neighbor, (says He) until you come into his place.” Dr. Jeremiah also says, “Judging is not only a bludgeon; it’s a boomerang!” Needless to say the yardstick you made with that log has no place here either, just sayin’.
4. “You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye.” (Matthew 7:5 ESV) Well gosh just the mere mentioning of a piece of lumber and we get this verse. The thing to note here is that a brother with a critical spirit will act as a spin doctor on the dance floor. Instead of carefully judging himself he will be easy on “his bad self” and “get all up in your grill” (I have been trying out some new slang with my teens…they have asked me to stop). Basically he is easier on himself than he is on you because he will overlook his own weakness and consider yours an abomination to the Throne of Grace, right?
5. “Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?” (Matthew 7:3 ESV) For those of you readers who are Colony men this verse is all too familiar isn’t it? We walk the hallways of the Colony banging each other in the head with our 2x4’s, trying to knock some sense into each other and never realizing that we were retarding the correction we needed to solve our own problems. John Gill once asked, “Dost thou think thy brother cannot see thy beam?” Just who are we fooling away, huh? Hmmm!
It was on page 14 in this pamphlet where in bold lettering, “FRIENDLY FIRE: REFRAIN FROM JUDGING OTHERS!” jumped right out at me, said I needed to go back, review my motives about this time period in my life and be aware of not becoming judge, jury and executioner. It doesn’t matter whether I am right about this issue or not, what really matters is not to assume a position on the Bema seat, remember that only God can judge the hearts of men and, truth be told, Jesus paid it all. Who do I think I am anyway? – Chris Hughes is a graduate of the Colony of Mercy and a regular Freedom Fighter contributor
Compass Pointers: “We should be very careful how we censure others when we have to deal with a Judge from whom we cannot conceal ourselves. When he comes to judge, “each one’s praise will come from God.” Christians may well be patient under unjust censures when they know a day such as this is coming. But how fearful should they be of loading any with reproaches now whom their common Judge shall later commend.” Grant Me Wisdom Matthew Henry
Anchored to the Rock: As artists give themselves to their models, and poets to their classical pursuits, so must we addict ourselves to prayer. C. H. Spurgeon
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