I knew it! "I knew he was too proud to take criticism," thought Anne, " and now I haveproof!"
On the previous Sunday, Anne had dropped a prayer card in the offering plate asking her pastor to stop in and pray with her when she went to the hospital for some minor surgery. When he failed to come by, she called the church secretary and learned that her pastor had already been to the hospital thatday to see another church member.
"So he has no excuse!" she thought. "He was in the building and knew I needed his support, but still he ignored me. He's resented me ever since I told him his sermons lack practical application. Now he's getting back at me by ignoring my spiritual needs. And he calls himself a shepherd!"
After brooding over his rejection for three days, Anne sat down Saturday evening and wrote a letter confronting her pastor about his pride, defensiveness and hypocrisy. As she sealed the envelope, she could not help thinking about the conviction he would feel when he opened his mail.
The moment she walked into church the next morning, one of the deacons hurried over to her. "Anne, I need to apologize to you. When I took the prayer cards out of the offering plates last week, I accidentally left your card with some pledge cards. I didn't notice my mistake until last night when I was totaling the pledges. I am so sorry I didn't get your request to the pastor!" Before Anne could reply to the deacon, her pastor approached her with a warm smile. "Anne, I was thinking about your comment about practical application as I finished my sermon yesterday. I hope you notice the difference in today's message."
Anne was speechless. All she could think about was the letter she had just dropped in a mailbox three blocks from church.
Judging Is Necessary but Dangerous
As Anne discovered, judging others can put us in embarrassing situations. Does this mean that we should never judge others? Not at all. As you interact with other people you must constantly interpret, evaluate, and form opinions regarding their qualities, words, and actions, so that you may respond to them appropriately (see Prov. 8:12-21, 9:1-6; Matt. 10:16; 1 Cor.2:11-16).
For example, when you buy something, you need to decide whether the seller is being honest about its quality and value. If someone disregards your advice, you need to interpret her actions so you can approach her more effectively. And when someone is nominated to a church office, the congregation needs to evaluate whether he is qualified to serve.
Although judging is a normal and necessary part of life, Scripture warns us that we have a natural tendency to judge others in a wrong way. For example, Jesus says:
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 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 the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out ofyour own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye. (Matt. 7:1-6)
As this passage teaches, when we evaluate and judge other people, our natural inclination is to ignore our own faults and to make critical judgments of others. Jesus is not forbidding critical thinking in the positive sense, which means to evaluate others' words and actions carefully so we can discriminate between truth and error, right and wrong (see Matt.7:15-16).
What he is warning us about is our inclination to make critical judgments inthe negative sense, which involves looking for others' faults and, without valid and sufficient reason, forming unfavorable opinions of their qualities, words, actions, or motives. In simple terms, it means looking forthe worst in others.
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