Judge not lest ye be
judged. Some verses bring us back to the King James Version by habit, don’t
they? This is one so familiar, and it sounds SO easy. None of us like to be
judged. Actually, that’s not quite true. We like to be judged but only on the
areas in which we excel. It’s when we are judged in an area where we are not
self-confident that we take issue. Judgment—it’s a thing we can all agree on; a
thing we wish others wouldn’t do.
It seems easy. Just don’t judge. But in a thousand little ways, we
feel we have to. It’s good business to judge—whether a person is trustworthy, whether
an investment is good, whether a candidate is right for a job. We have to
judge. Heck, I’ve mentioned before that I come from a line of Cadwells whose
job was to judge. Like so many things Jesus says, it seems so simple until you
actually put it into practice. Then, things get messy.
I’m reminded of that Bertrand
Russell quote, “The fundamental cause of the trouble in the modern world today
is that the stupid are [sure of themselves] while the intelligent so full of
doubt.” I think Jesus would agree. The wise will doubt themselves—will doubt
their own capacity to make right judgments. The wise will understand that
everything we do in this life, every choice we make, is covered by sin,
stretching back to the Garden of Eden and forward to time immemorial. The wise
will be full of doubts, and their judgments will always be humble and meek,
because they know they are not God.
The life of faith Jesus would have
us lead is one where we hold this faith lightly, understanding that the
strongest faith is the one held with a dose of humility, and the weakest faith
is often the one that feigns strength. To hold faith lightly is not to wait
something better, and not to lack in assurance and trust, but instead it means
we are aware of our limitations—that we are human beings, full of poor
judgments, and faith is not something of our own that we can control; it is
something given to us as a gift, which should make us humble.
“Judge not lest ye be judged” is not
only about how we are supposed to act
toward one another; it’s about the perspective we have on life, and it’s about
understanding that there is truly very little that separates us one from
another—a little bit of luck; a little bit of chance; a twist of fate; maybe
some divine direction. To follow Jesus is to admit that we are incapable of
saving ourselves. We don’t need to justify ourselves before the throne of the
cross. We don’t need to look at everybody else around us and point out how much
less of a hypocrite we are by comparison, because the moment you do it, you’re
a bigger one. It’s a paradox Jesus understands perfectly.
“The road is wide that leads to
destruction,” he says, “and many take it, but the gate is narrow and the road
is hard that leads to life, and there are few who find it.
The funny thing is how many
Christians take the rest of Matthew 7, using this verse and the one about
knocking on the door, and talk about how salvation is hard, so, therefore, many
must be heading to hell. Probably all the people I disagree with—probably all
the people who scare me. The chapter literally starts by telling you not to
judge, but by verse 13, half of the Christian world is foaming at the mouth in
fire and brimstone, deciding who is in and who is out. This is because many
Christians only get most of the way there. They believe salvation is hard, and
if salvation if hard, then this is the world you are left with—a world where
few are saved and most are damned. But salvation isn’t hard; it’s impossible.
This is the thing the disciples misunderstand every single time.
Matthew 7 is a perfect illustration
of the distinction between cheap grace and free grace. Cheap grace says you
don’t have to do much. Cheap grace says, “All you have to do is have a little
faith, and presumably things will work out.” Cheap grace is everywhere, because
it is eminently compatible with the industrial revolution and the modern world
that tells you: “You deserve it.” Just help yourself! Cheap grace acts like
Jesus is the one saving you, but really it’s about a choice you are making—a
door you are opening. Cheap grace is judgment of a very particular kind—it’s
saying, “I know the way to salvation, and it is the path I am walking.”
Free grace is far less sexy than
cheap grace. It won’t make you popular. Free grace is the worker arriving at
the end of the day and receiving the same full day’s pay as the one working
from all day in the sun. Free grace is for people with a past, but, more than
that, it’s for people who are still inadequate in the present and will continue
to be in the future. Free grace is for those whose conversion doesn’t make them
perfect. Free grace is God’s forgiveness for me in spite of me. More than that,
free grace is humble about the path of discipleship; it does not assume a thing
about the path that others are walking, because free grace is the understanding
that my sins will preoccupy myself more than enough, and to occupy myself with
the sins of others is only ever going to be a distraction.
Free grace will never be popular.
People want self-help. We want a promise that if I put in sufficient work, and
if I’m a good enough person, I will get what I want. Free grace doesn’t make
that promise. Instead, it points out how terrible you are at helping yourself,
it points out that that thing you want is not actually the thing that will save
you, and it shows you the path to Jesus when you’re looking for the path to
fame, fortune, security, or comfort.
Once you understand your deep need
for free grace (and not the cheap knock-off), you will read Matthew 7—and,
really, all of scripture—with a different lens. Suddenly, Jesus’ warnings about
how we should act are not law; in fact, they are not warnings at all. Rather,
they are gospel; they are the good news of how we can act as people free in
Jesus Christ. He is not telling you that you need to do something to be saved.
Rather, he’s saying: Since you are already saved—since you have this gift that
you couldn’t earn, that was given to you no matter how terrible you sometimes
are—now, here is what it looks like to be a Jesus-follower.
Don’t judge, because free grace
abhors judgment. Ask, and it will be given to you, because once you have
received this grace, you will begin to ask for what you actually need and not
the things you crave to satisfy a longing that you can never fill. More than anything,
build your faith on something secure—not your whims, which so often change, but
on the grace of God that takes you no matter how bad you are.
At the end of the day, Jesus is
preaching a sermon about God’s forgiveness, which is yours. All of yours. And
it doesn’t matter how bad you were, which is completely radical. God’s
forgiveness extends to the whole spectrum of human behavior, because it is
free. And we might not like that. We might look at the news, begin to believe
that some people are animals and unworthy of forgiveness. We might judge. But
that will end up being self-defeating, because the moment you judge is the
moment you make grace cheap. Instead, believe in the power of God’s grace to
extend to the ends of the universe. Grace isn’t cheap; it’s free. So, why
judge? It won’t get you anywhere. You saved by grace—free grace; grace that
will set you free.
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