This transcript was generated by whisper.ai.

I want to welcome you to week 8 of our look through the book of Matthew. We're
in Matthew chapter 7 this week, the first part of Matthew chapter 7. We're going
to be looking at verses 1 to 5 today and also all this week.

As we're continuing in Matthew 5, 6, and 7, we're continuing to look at what
we're calling Jesus' life management seminar. And we've looked at how to manage
your attitudes, how to manage your relationships with others and with God, how
to manage your possessions, how to manage your possessions and your anxieties
about those possessions. In this chapter, all through this chapter, we're going
to talk about how do you manage the direction of your life.

And one of the key decisions that we all have to make about the direction of our
lives has to do with how we handle the fact that all of us have sinned, all of
us have faults. How do you handle the faults, the mistakes, and even the sins of
the people that are around you and that are in your own life? There's a lot of
directions you can go, and the direction you go sets the direction of your life.

You can go in the direction of blame. You can go in the direction of anger, of
faking it, of hypocrisy, of pride. Jesus talks about this at the beginning of
this chapter.

It's one of the most familiar, it's one of the most often quoted, and it's one
of the most misunderstood passages in all of Jesus' teaching. In Matthew chapter
seven, verses one to five, here's what Jesus said, "Do not judge, or you too
will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged.

And with the measure that you use, it will be measured to you. " Why do you look
at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank
in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, "Let me take that speck out of
your eye," when all the time there's a plank in your own eye?

You hypocrite. First, take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see
clearly to remove the speck that's in your brother's eye. Now these words of
Jesus, there is a great deal of confusion over the words of Jesus, "Do not
judge, or you too will be judged.

" There's also a great deal of power in what Jesus taught about judgment.
There's a teaching here that holds the promise of dramatic change in your life,
the direction of your life, even the direction of your relationships. This
passage, these five verses, are one of the most meaningful passages in all of
Scripture for me.

In fact, I devoted an entire week to it in my Relationship Principles of Jesus
book. And I want to share some of that with you, a little bit different this
week. I want to share some of that with you as we walk through this passage this
week.

Because these words have the power to revolutionize the direction of your life.
They have the power to revolutionize your relationships, your marriage. They
have the power to make your family life more joyful.

Those who take to heart what Jesus teaches about judgment, they develop really a
more magnetic personality. They're the kind of people that you're drawn to, that
you want to be around. They're the kind of people that are sought out for
advice.

Because they are seeking to live out Jesus' principle, "Don't judge, for in the
same way you judge others, you will be judged. " My in-laws, Dot and Jimmy
Warren, had a profound influence on my life and on the life of hundreds of
others in large measure because they lived out these words of Jesus. They
understood how to offer love and truth without being judgmental.

Their approach had a deep effect on their relationships. So instead of rejecting
a pastor who had divorced his wife and left the ministry, they kept the door
open and they served as an instrument to help him recover his spiritual health.
They didn't excuse his sin, yet they accepted him in a way that let him know he
wasn't alone.

Instead of making those who didn't know Jesus feel like they were outsiders,
they welcomed them in as part of the family around the supper table or as
fishing partners out on the lake. Instead of letting their concern that their
daughter Shondell was dating a very young Christian at the time, and that causes
them to look down their spiritual nose at that very young Christian, instead
they welcomed me with open arms and they became a major influence in my growth
and loving Jesus in my ministry. If these words of Jesus are going to have any
impact on our lives, we've got to reject the attractive and yet cowardly and
false interpretation of what he's saying.

The cowardly approach to being non-judgmental says, "You live your life, I'll
live mine. I won't say anything about you, you don't say anything about me. "
That sounds good in one sense, doesn't it?

We all want to avoid the unpleasantness of confronting problems in a
relationship or in a friend's life. Even more, we don't like it when others
confront the things we don't want to change in our own lives. But it's
interesting that right after saying, "Don't judge," Jesus is going to teach in a
few verses, "Don't give dogs what is sacred, don't throw pearls before swine,
before pigs.

" He obviously has a different way of looking at things. He has no problem
encouraging us to discern someone's willingness to listen to the truth. So you
have to judge something there.

Think about the teaching of Jesus, the life of Jesus. How could Jesus say, "You
hypocrites," when he talked to the Pharisees? Isn't that judging?

You have to realize there's a difference between judging a person's motives and
responding to a person's actions. There's a difference between judging a
person's eternity and acting on the current situation. We get this confused
sometimes.

Many take this to mean you can't ever tell someone else or think that anything
they're doing is wrong. If you can't judge anyone in that way, that's crazy.
Then no parent could ever tell a child that they were wrong.

It isn't really possible to be completely non-judgmental in that kind of a way.
Because then even telling someone else that she's being judgmental would be a
judgmental thing to do. Being non-judgmental doesn't mean being non-aware.

That's not what Jesus is talking about here. You see the person's problem. Maybe
even you need to deal with it because you're involved with it in some way, but
you don't judge them in it.

You see that your child is disobeying. Maybe you even give them a time out, but
you don't think of them as a wicked little sinner who could never be loved of
God because of what they're going through. One of the most important keys to
living this truth of being truly non-judgmental towards others is understanding
God's judgment.

The skill of responding to another person's actions with integrity and mercy,
but not hypocrisy is one of the most difficult relationship skills that any of
us can develop. Some of us, we veer too far on the side of excusing sins, and
sometimes maybe we veer too far to the side of prideful judgment. Few of us ever
totally get it right all the time.

One of the keys to strengthening this skill. I want to strengthen this skill. I
want you to strengthen this skill.

Is growing in our understanding of God's judgment over all mankind. Words about
judgment, even as we're talking about this today, they're difficult for many of
us. We know that God's a God of love, a God of grace, a God of beauty.

And something in us cringes when we see such words as "judge" and "judgment"
attached to the name of God. So we naturally tend to drift toward ignoring those
words and focusing on the words that feel warmer, that feel more loving. There
are just too many uncomfortable questions that flood our minds when we think
about judgment.

But when you try to figure out all the ways, all the judgments of God, of course
you're going to feel uncomfortable and sometimes even confused. That's because
God is the judge and you're not. Now I don't mean that to sound flippant or
simplistic because it is not.

The answer to figuring out the judgments of God is not in some philosophical
understanding. It's found in personal trust. God, who loves this world and
everyone in it more than I could ever hope to, he is the ultimate judge.

I can trust him. God who sees every injustice that's ever been done and knows
every motive of every heart, he's the final judge and I can trust him. Now the
truth about God's judgment, it could fill volumes.

But here our focus is on how an understanding of God's judgment can cause you
and I to become less judgmental. It's all too easy to think that those who
recognize that God is judge become more judgmental, but actually the opposite is
true. Understanding God's judgment, that he's the judge, it frees you to not
have to be judgmental because you know you can leave it in his hands.

He is the judge. Freedom from being judgmental comes as you remember the truth
that God will judge fairly, as you remember the truth that now is not the time
for final judgment, as you remember the truth that you can face that final
judgment with confidence because of what Jesus has done for you because God is
rich in mercy and forgiveness. Let's look at those truths a little bit more
closely.

First you remember the truth that God is the only fair judge. The more I trust
God is the only fair judge, the less judgmental I'll be. To have healthy
relationships, there's a decision that you and I have to make every day.

You have to leave judgment, ultimate judgment in God's hands. You practice what
Paul tells us in Romans 12, 19, "Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room
for God's wrath, for it's written, 'It's mine to avenge. I will repay,' says the
Lord.

" You let God work out his judgment. You can trust him with it. You trust in the
truth that God will judge fairly.

There's a second thing that causes us to become less judgmental, and that is the
more I trust in God's timing. The more I trust in God's timing, the less
judgmental I'll be. The truth that God will judge in his time keeps me from
yielding to the temptation to rush to judgment.

In 1 Corinthians 4, 5, Paul writes, "Judge nothing before the appointed time. "
Healthy relationships demand that I await ultimate judgment until God's time.
Sometimes we act like we're like two questions into this thousand-question test,
and we want to give the grade already.

Now we might be able to see something of how we're doing so far, but it's not
over yet. We can't give the final score yet. You trust God's timing for final
judgment.

And there's one final truth about being less judgmental, and that is the more
confidently I face the day of judgment, the less judgmental I'll be. John 5, 24,
Jesus said, "In all truth I tell you, whoever listens to my words and believes
in the one who sent me has eternal life. Without being brought to judgment, such
a person has passed from death to life.

" That's the promise of God in Jesus Christ. You know that one day you can face
him with confidence and joy. You don't have to worry about that day of judgment
because of what Jesus has done for you, because of the love that he has for you.

Anyone who's accepted the gift of God's mercy and forgiveness, we can live with
that confidence. And that confidence causes us to be free to be less judgmental
in our lives. Now for a moment, I want us to look together in prayer to the one
who, because of his love for us, has decided that instead of judging us for
eternity, he's going to love us for all eternity in Christ.

Let's tell him how grateful we are. Our Father, we are grateful. We're grateful
for your love.

And we pray that you'd help us to understand how these words of Jesus fit into
our lives. Help us to understand this truth about judgment as never before.
Instead of living in confusion about who and what we can rightly judge, help us
to learn from you how to reject hypocrisy, how to choose integrity, how to show
mercy in our lives.

We ask that you teach us to do this, Jesus. You're the only one that can really
teach us. And we ask it in your name, Amen.

Tomorrow we're going to look together at the truth about hypocrisy, integrity,
and mercy.