#46 Lu. 6:37, 41-42,  LEARNING TO BE LESS CRITICAL

Introduction:

    Before I announce my text and my subject let me ask you a question:  How
many of you think that you are still capable of learning?  My subject is:
Learning To Be Less Critical."
    This text is a continuation of the Sermon On The Mount as preached by
Jesus and as recorded by Luke.  What Jesus covered in just one sermon, it is
taking me several sermons to cover. We studied the Beatitudes as Luke
recorded them.  Jesus commanded us to love people.  We are love even our
enemies and do good even to them.  In this third sermon Jesus teaches us
that we are not to have a critical attitude toward others.  We are not to
judge others.

I.  The commands

    V. 37, "Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall
not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven."  In this verse Jesus
gave three commands and each command has promise.
    The first command is, "Judge not..."  This command has to do with our
personal relationship with other people.  Jesus does not forbid that one who
occupies a position of responsibility over others to hold them accountable
for their actions.  For instance, He does not forbid a parent or a teacher
from correcting a child.  It is his responsibility to correct the child.
Likewise He does not forbid the superintendent of a plant from firing a
worker who does not do his work.  Nor does He forbid the foreman on a job
from judging the work of his men and dealing with them accordingly.  Nor
does He forbid a jury from hearing the evidence in a case and making a
judgment concerning the accused.  Nor does He forbid a church from
administering church discipline against one of its members.  Neither does He
forbid the Christian from preaching and teaching against sin.  This command
should not stop the Christian from condemning sin in every possible way.
This command has to do with one's personal relations with others.  We are
not be harsh and critical in our evaluation of other people.  Especially we
are not to set ourselves up as judges of other people.  We are not to be
self-appointed judge over others.
    Now if man had never fallen into sin, this would not be a problem.
There would be no fault in anyone.  The other fellow would not have some
fault for us to judge and we would not be inclined to look for faults.  But
since man has fallen into sin this is a problem with us all.  Everybody
around us has faults and failures and we have such a big failure within
ourselves that we look for their faults and point them out.  Our own sin
nature causes us not only to look for the fault of other people, but to
magnify it ten-fold when we do find one.
    The chief reason we are inclined to look for the faults of the other
fellow is that if we can call everybody's attention to his faults, perhaps
they will not notice our own.  If we do not call attention to their faults,
then it is almost certain that people are going to take notice of our's.  Is
that not right?
    We are all subject to doing such a thing.  Even Christians are subject
to doing such a thing.  The very best of Christian is subject to doing such
a thing.  We still live in the old depraved human flesh which has not been
born again and the flesh nature is inclined to be overly critical toward
others around.  As far as the flesh nature is concerned, we are all inclined
to be critical of everybody around us.  We are inclined to be critical of
our family members.  We are all inclined to be critical of our fellow
Christians.  We are inclined to be critical of everybody we come in contact
with.  We are so inclined to be critical of others that when we look in the
mirror, we are also critical of the person we see in the mirror.
    But Jesus says, "Stop being so critical!  Stop trying to judge other
people.  Stop looking for their faults and failures.  Try, instead, looking
for something to appreciate about them.  Stop letting the depraved flesh
nature govern your life and start letting your born-again spirit govern your
life.  Your born-again spirit will love everybody---even your enemies and
will seek to do them good.  It is the depraved, sinful flesh nature that
seeks to find something in somebody else to criticize.  Finding fault with
others is a way of trying to justify ourselves for our own failures.  When
God questioned Adam about why he ate the forbidden fruit, Adam blamed it on
the woman.  "It's her fault, Lord.  She made me do it." Likewise, today if
somebody stops coming to church, it is never their fault; it is always
somebody else's fault that they stopped coming.  We try to justify whatever
fault we see in ourselves by pointing out the fault in somebody else.  Is
that not right?
    But Jesus has commanded that we stop trying to judge other people and
has give us a great incentive to try to keep His command.  Jesus said,
"Judge not, and ye shall not be judged..."  This is the incentive.  If you
set yourself up as a self appointed judge of other people, then it is most
certain that you are going to be judged in the same manner that you have
judged them.  The Bible says, "Whatsoever ye shall sow, ye shall reap" and
that includes the judging of others.  If you have looked for the faults of
others and magnified their faults tenfold, then people are going to start
looking for your faults and when they find them they are going to magnify
your faults and make them ten times as bad as they are.  Heaven knows, your
faults are bad enough as they are, but to make them ten times as bad is far
worse.  But if that is the way you deal with others, then that is the way
somebody is going to deal with you.
    On the other hand, if you are so critical of others, then, at least as a
general rule, they will not be so critical of you.  Jesus has promised it.
    But there is an even greater promise here that I hope you will notice.
If you are harsh and critical and unforgiving toward others, then not only
will other people be harsh and critical and unforgiving toward you, but the
Lord, Himself, will be harsh and critical and unforgiving toward you.  But
if you heed the command of the Lord and learn not to be so critical of
others, then that is the way that even the Lord, Himself will deal with you.
If you overlook the faults and failures of others, then He is going to
overlook your faults and failures.  If you are kind and loving and
considerate toward others in spite of their faults, then, Christian friend,
the Lord will be kind and loving and considerate toward you in spite of your
faults.  That is what the Lord has promised.
    The second command is right along the same line.  (V. 37), "...condemn
not, and ye shall not be condemned..."  The chief difference in this command
and the first command lies in the difference in the two words Jesus used.
It is one thing to look for the faults of somebody else and call everybody's
attention to those faults, but it is another thing to try to make sure that
they pay the penalty for their faults.  The word, condemn, as it is used
here carries the idea that the critic not only calls everybody's attention
to the fault of the guilty party, but he takes it upon himself to see to it
that he gets punished for his fault.
    Jesus has said in effect, "You go ahead and try to bring punishment on
that person for his fault and you will reap what you have sown.  There will
be others who will point out your faults and they will go on a personal
campaign to see to it that you suffer the consequences of your error.  You
will reap what you have sown.  But on the other hand, if you do not condemn
others and if you will not try to see that they get their just due, the when
you do wrong, others who see your fault will be lenient toward you.  As
Jesus said back in the beatitudes, "Blessed are the merciful, for they shall
receive mercy."
    But, again, there is more involved than just the mercy that other people
will show unto us.  If we are not lenient toward others but press the issue
to see that they get their just due, then the Lord, Himself, will not be
lenient toward us and He will press the issue to see that we get our own
just due.  But on the other hand, if we are lenient toward others then the
Lord will be lenient toward us.
    The third command, at first, may not seem to be related at all to the
first two commands, but actually it is.  (V. 37), "...forgive, and ye shall
be forgiven."  Jesus said, "Forgive.."  Forgive what?  What is it that we
are to forgive?  It is the answer to this question that ties this command
into the other two.  Forgive the fault that we see in the other person.
Even if the fault is an act of offence toward us personally, forgive.  If we
do not forgive, then we need not expect to be forgiven.  If we do not
forgive others their faults against us, then others will not forgive our
faults against them.  Again we see that we reap what we sow and if we are
unforgiving toward others, then others will be unforgiving toward us.  But
what is even more important than having other people to forgive us is our
need to have God forgive us.  If we do not forgive people their trespasses
toward us, then God will not forgive our trespasses.  On the other hand, if
we do forgive others, then our Heavenly Father will also forgive us.
    Let me say to you that this should give us a great big incentive to
learn to be less critical and to be more forgiving toward others.  If we are
less critical toward other people then God will be less critical of us.  If
we are more forgiving toward others then God will be more forgiving toward
us.
    I know that we live in weak, depraved, sinful human bodies which do not
at all want to be lenient and forgiving toward others, but we can learn.  By
the grace of God we can learn to be a lot less critical than we have been in
the past.  And we can learn to be lot more forgiving than we have been in
the past.  For one thing, we can pray for God to help us and God will help
us to learn.

II.  The questions

    Now in verse 37 Jesus gave three commands and each command had a promise
which would give us incentive to keep the promise.  In verses forty-one and
forty-two Jesus directs several questions.  V. 41 "And why beholdest thou
the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but perceivest not the beam that is
in thine own eye?"  A mote is a tiny speck.  A beam is a support beam such
as is used in the construction of a building.
    The verse asks, "Why?"  "Why do you look for the mote in your brother's
eye when there is a beam in your own eye?"  The answer is that your own
motive is wrong.  You do not have righteous indignation about your brother's
fault.  You have a personal grudge that you are carrying.  You have
unrighteous indignation.
    The second question is found in verse 42.  V.  42, "Either how canst
thou say to thy brother, Brother, let me pull out the mote that is in thine
eye, when thou thyself beholdest not the beam that is in thine own
eye?"  The answer to that question is that he cannot.  He cannot see how to
get the mote out of his brother's eye as long as the beam is in his own eye.
Jesus said such a fault-finding person is a hypocrite.  He is a critical
minded, fault-finding hypocrite.
    The counsel that Jesus has to give such a person is found in the latter
part of verse forty-two.  "...Thou hypocrite, cast out first the beam out of
thine own eye, and then shalt thou see clearly to pull out the mote that is
in thy brother's eye."  The first task that a critic has is to correct his
own mistakes.  When the Pharisees came to Jesus wanting Him to have a woman
stoned to death, Jesus said, "He that is without sin, let him cast the first
stone."  They all went away.
    Let me repeat.  This command from Jesus is not intended to keep us from
speaking out against sin and immorality.  It is not intended to keep us from
speaking out against dishonest, thievery, robbery, murder, adultery, lying,
cursing or any other wrong doing which the Bible condemns.  But it is
intended to keep us from setting ourselves up as the personal judge of other
people.  God the Father said that even He is not the Judge of those who do
wrong.  He said that He has given all judgment into the hands of Jesus
Christ, His Son.  He said that Jesus will judge all men.  Well, since Jesus
Christ is the Judge, then it is foolish for anyone else to try to be the
judge.  It is foolish for me to try to be the judge of others.  It is
foolish for you to try to be the judge of others.
    We have enough to do to try to correct our own faults.  Then when, by
the help of God, we correct a fault in our own lives, we may legitimately
then try to help someone else who is struggling to try to overcome the same
fault in their own lives.

Conclusion:

    Let me ask each one of you a personal question: Have you ever been
saved?  Have you ever turned to the Lord Jesus Christ and asked Him to save
you from your sin?  I think you know that you are a sinner.  Don't you?  I
think you know that you need to be forgiven from your sin.  Don't you?  I
think you know that you can never overcome your own sin by yourself.  Don't
you?  I think you know that the Bible teaches that Jesus Christ is the only
one in this whole world who can save you from your sin.  Don't you?  I think
you know that it is foolish for you to keep putting off the salvation of
your soul until some other time.  Don't you?
    Listen, I am not asking you to come to a God who hates you and despises
you because of the sin you have done.  I am asking you to come to a God who
loves you in spite of what you have done.  He loves you and is waiting to
save you, but He won't wait forever.  You are going to have to make up your
mind to come to Jesus and get saved or else one of these days it is going to
be too late.  All I am asking you to do is to come on and get it over with
before it is too late.  Won't you come?
    I think that it is time for all of us to do some praying.  Don't you?