6: 37-42
“Do not judge others, and you will not be judged.”
“Do not condemn others, or it will all come back against you.”
“Forgive others, and you will be forgiven.”
When I first read these, I felt justified in my inner thoughts. Throughout my life, I have felt judged by others because I felt I was very different from them. I felt that people looked down on me and did not want to be around me, so I would make myself as little as possible when I was around them. I never shared how I felt deep down. With those who I did build a friendship with, conversations were somewhat superficial on my end. I would help them to no end if they needed it, and we would talk about things happening around us and they would share their life challenges, and I would listen and offer advice. If I shared anything about myself, it would be in the context of what they shared with me in an attempt to bond with them and let them know that I understood. I would not dive deep; however.
There are only a small handful of people I have shared with on a deep level over the years, with the majority coming into my life over the past 14 years as I began to question things and search for what I felt like was calling me from within. For those few folks, they got an earful and I felt bad afterwards, so disappeared into the background again and changed any follow up conversations to superficial conversations around anything but what I was going through.
What I started to realize was that I was so focused on how I felt others were judging me that I did not even see how I judged others! As much as I don’t want to admit it, I did judge anyone who was not like me. I painted a picture in my mind of how other people were and how they saw me, and changed my thoughts, behaviors and actions to reflect those judgments. If I felt uncomfortable around someone, I avoided them. I determined based the appearance of someone, the environment they were in and the words and actions I saw, how that person must be and as a result, it changed my thoughts, decisions and actions around them. If I’m honest at all, there have been plenty of times where I put myself up on a pedestal and thought I was better than those I interacted with – if only they would (fill in the blank), then they could experience (fill in the blank). There have also been many people throughout my life who I felt were better than me – and I avoided them. I felt so small around them and was afraid if they saw the real me, they would not want anything to do with me. I started to realize how messed up I really was and how I did need forgiveness and grace, and more importantly, someone to teach me how to change – how to love others through an internal love within that can see others without judgement, without disapproval for who they are as a person and to forgive them for any wrongs I feel come my way from them. I have made progress, but I am far from perfect in this area – and I don’t think we can ever be perfect.
The key is recognizing when these judgments and condemnations happen and to ask for forgiveness and grace so that our internal love can shine through to others. It is also recognizing when we feel someone has done something to hurt us, to forgive them and to pray for them. Again, forgiveness is not saying that we are OK with the behaviors, decisions and actions of others who we feel have hurt us. It is not carrying around all the anger, frustration, and disappointment within our bodies so that we can continue to love others as Jesus taught us to do. It is praying for someone who we feel has hurt us in one way or another. It is lifting that person and/or situation up to God and asking him to surround them with his love – and going about our life without carrying around the weight of anger, frustration and disappointment so our future thoughts, decisions and actions are not clouded.
It is important to note that Jesus is not saying to practice careful discernment – we need to learn to judge well. There is a place for judgment, but it is not what we typically define judgment as. It is encountering a person or a situation and taking any uncomfortable feelings to God and listening to the inner voice to help us guide our thoughts, decisions and actions in that moment or future moments.
Jesus then taught about giving:
“Give, and you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full – pressed down, shaken together to make room for more, running over, and poured into your lap. The amount you give will determine the amount you get back.”
My initial thoughts when reading this was what I learned from the Law of Attraction: the positive and negative thoughts we have bring about positive or negative experiences into our lives. This equates our thoughts to an energy that operates like a magnet. If we have positive thoughts around a certain situation, over time, that situation would match our thoughts. Similarly, if we have negative thoughts around a certain situation, over time, that situation would also match our thoughts.
This is not what Jesus is teaching us. He is not saying, that I can change my circumstances just from positive thinking, or that if I give money to help someone out that I will receive a plethora of money as a result of my actions. What he is saying is to evaluate my thoughts, decisions and actions. Where are they coming from? He is saying to be fair to others – even those who challenge me, because the measures I use for others in judging them or a situation will come back to me. If I am generous in my thoughts, actions and decisions towards others, that same type of generosity will come back to me. If I am stingy in my thoughts, actions and decisions and uncharitable, those same type of standards which I apply to others will be returned to me. It is super important for me to evaluate my thoughts and where my actions and decisions are coming from. I am not perfect though. I still make mistakes. I have triggers and can quickly be taken down the wrong road and those feelings of anger, resentment, disappointment and frustration will surface very quickly. The difference now, is that I can begin to recognize them. I will talk to God about them to see if I acted unfairly, if I should make a change and if so, what does that look like. If the response is that I need to change my thoughts, decisions and actions, I work on doing that. Even in this, I am not perfect. It’s amazing how the feelings of “giving in” and being wronged can grip me and keep me from doing what I know inside, is the right thing to do.
Then Jesus gave the following illustrations:
“Can one blind person lead another? Won’t they both fall into a ditch?”
He is warning us about following the wrong person. Spiritually blind leaders mislead those who follow them. This is where discernment comes into play. Discernment is basically the ability to obtain spiritual guidance and understanding around a certain situation. It is not acting without talking to God first and seeing the situation through the eyes of God rather than our own eyes. When I was first reading the Bible and learning about Jesus, others who I would talk to about this would give me a book to read or a podcast or CD to listen to. I would get taken away in what I was hearing and could feel myself get all worked up; however, some of the things that I was reading and listening to felt like they were a little different from what I was reading in the Bible. Something felt off, but felt great at the same time. I felt justified in some of my past actions and thinking and that I would not have to take responsibility for anything; however, that was not what I was learning when I was reading the Bible. I gave one of the CDs to my pastor and asked for his opinion on the material. He said that although there are some truths in what was being said, it was basically a marketing tool for the person who recorded it. I felt deflated. My hopes had risen in that what was on the CD could justify some things in my past and honestly, now that I look back, it got me all worked up and angered around those who I felt wronged by. His response deflated all my hopes. I just kept reading the Bible hoping that I could not just get through it, but understand it and figure out how to apply it to my life.
He helped me to discern something that to me, had answers to questions I had that justified my past thoughts, behaviors and actions, but felt a bit off at the same time. At the time, I didn’t know whether to trust what I had heard. Which one was right? The good feelings I had while listening to it, or the feelings that it was somehow off in it’s teaching? I learned over time, to take these types of things to God and ask him what he thought – and it took a lot of time and practice to learn to know which feeling to follow – and I’m still learning. I see pictures of shows I’ve seen in the past where there is a devil on one shoulder and an angel on another and they are both giving the person their opinions on a certain decision or action to take. That is exactly how I felt – and figuring out which one is which takes some time!
“Students are not greater than their teacher. But the student who is fully trained will become like the teacher.”
It is important to find someone who is grounded in God’s word and who can listen and give advice objectively, based on what’s written in the Bible and not from their own feelings or opinions. Over time, and after several years of reading and studying the Bible, I started to be able to use my own discernment.
“And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own? How can you think of saying, ‘Friend, let me help you get rid of that speck in your eye,’ when you can’t see past the log in your own eye? Hypocrite! First get rid of the log in your own eye; then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your friend’s eye.”
This teaching became very important to me as I continued on my walk with God. It was very easy for me to see others situations and give advice on how I thought they should handle them. I found out through my searching that it was very easy for me to judge others and the situations they encountered as well. While helping others through the anger, disappointment and frustration I had inside, I was running from my own life situations. It was much easier to focus on someone else and to see their downfalls than to face my own. A hypocrite harshly criticizes a small weakness in someone else’s life while overlooking a large fault in their own life. This was me – and that realization hit hard. I had always thought of myself as someone who had good intentions and who helped others. By not dealing with my own shortcomings, I was in no position to criticize anyone else’s situation – even if it was just in my thoughts and not said out loud.