Don't Judge Me!

Don’t judge me!
A closer look at one of the most commonly quoted verses in the Bible.

“You shouldn’t be judging me! Don’t you know that Jesus said, ‘do not judge’?”

How many times have you heard that? Those kinds of statements are becoming more and more common, by believers and unbelievers alike. If they have a way of making you stop in your tracks, it’s because that’s often what they’re meant to do. It’s an excellent conversation-stopper. After all, you don’t want to make yourself look like you’re disagreeing with Jesus.

The problem is, that verse, Matthew 7:1, is one of the most commonly misunderstood verses in the Bible. For one thing, the meaning that the verse is given in the argument mentioned above is self-refuting. The very statement, “you should not judge” is itself a judgment. That person is judging that you are wrong to judge their behavior, and therefore they are guilty of the same thing they just accused you of.

People will often quote verse 3, which says, "Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?” but you will rarely hear anyone continue on to verse 5, which says, “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.” When Jesus instructs us to take the speck out of our brother’s eye, he is telling us that we should point out that person’s sin. But doesn’t that mean we have to judge them, even though verse 1 said we shouldn’t do that? Jesus isn’t contradicting himself here. By reading verse 5, we can figure out what the real context of the verse is. Jesus is only speaking against one particular kind of judgment.

The Bible talks about three kinds of judgment. The first is judicial, like the kind of judgment made by a court of law or by the church. One example of this is found in 1 Corinthians 5:3-5, where Paul is writing to the church about a man who is living in sin with his stepmother. He says, “As though I were there, I have already passed judgment on this man in the name of the Lord Jesus. You must call a meeting of the church…Then you must throw this man out and hand him over to Satan so that his sinful nature will be destroyed and he himself will be saved on the day the Lord returns.” The Bible commands that these types of judgments be made.

Another kind of judgment is a rational evaluation of the facts. Nobody can go through life without making this kind of judgment. I think that almost anyone would agree that going on a killing spree simply for the fun of it is wrong. Anyone who agrees with that is making a judgment. This kind of judging is also commanded of us. Matthew 18:15-20 says, "If your brother sins, go and show him his fault in private; if he listens to you, you have won your brother. But if he does not listen to you, take one or two more with you, so that by the mouth of two or three witnesses every fact may be confirmed. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.” So if you look at the facts (Person A is doing X), make a rational evaluation (The Bible says that X is sin so therefore person A is doing something wrong), and tell that person why what they are doing is wrong, you are doing exactly what the Bible says you should do.

The kind of judging that Jesus tells us we should not do in Matthew 7:1 is hypocritical or unkind judging. If we confront a person for committing the very sin that we ourselves are involved in, we are being hypocritical. Of course, we can’t wait until we are completely free from all sin before confronting someone else because that would be impossible. If you want to warn someone else who is involved in the same sin that you are currently struggling to get out of, you aren’t being a hypocrite. However, if you are making no attempt to get the sin out of your own life, you have no business telling someone else that they should. Also, if we approach people with condemnation, we are guilty of a sinful attitude. We should always approach people with a desire to help them remove the sin from their life, with a kind and compassionate attitude.

So if someone tells you that you shouldn’t judge them because Jesus said so, help them understand the self-refuting nature of their understanding of the passage, and explain to them what Jesus was really talking about.