Yesterday my family and I listened to a message from Grace Family Baptist Church by Voddie Baucham. Here is a link if you are interested. Listen
I thought I would share what I learned about judging. He said that the new staple verse people quote is "do not judge, least you be judged." And this can be paraphrased by simply saying "hey, don't judge me." The tricky thing about judging is that we are commanded not to make judgements like in Romans 14:10 Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God. And we are commanded to make judgements like in 1 Corinthians 5:12-13 For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge? 13 God judges those outside. “ Purge the evil person from among you.
Voddie made a distinction that I thought was very helpful. He said there was a difference between "passing" a judgement, and "making judgements." We make judgements all the time. We can not function in this world if we do not judge things. We are even commanded in Scripture to not only made a judgement toward another person who is in sin, but also to go to the person (Matthew 18). But passing a judgment is something only God is qualified to do.
Passing a judgement is judging the motives and intentions of another person. We don't even know our own motives very good, how could we be qualified to pass a judgment on another persons motives. Voddie said we lack the "authority" to pass a judgement, we lack the "in-site" to pass a judgment, we lack the "purity" to pass a judgment, and we lack the "occasion" to pass judgments. Jesus alone has the in-site, the authority, the purity and the occasion.
If you have a spare 45 minutes this week, head over to the link and have a listen. It was very helpful for me. Happy Monday!
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