Bayside Baptist Church

Jason King: How's everybody doing this morning?

Guest (Male): Woo!

Jason King: Y'all gotta do better than that. I mean, we just saw four students get baptized. Let's go!

Guest (Male): Woo!

Jason King: Right? I was jealous, I love the beach. I want to baptize kids at the beach. That's awesome. That is awesome. Aren't y'all glad Kip is our student pastor?

Guest (Male): Yeah!

Jason King: Yeah. I'm just excited what God's doing in our student ministry, how God's leading him. I mean, it's awesome. I mean, that'll just preach right there. We can just go home now. I mean, that's awesome.

Y'all, we're we're still in our series on folk theology, debunk myths, debunking myths and legends and breaking down what God's word has to say about different topics. And today's title is no different. Christians should not judge.

And I have to tell you this. I was uh sitting at my table finishing up things, getting prepared for today, and uh like you know, it's hard enough when you stand in this space, right, to preach God's word. And then you get a really like heavy message in front of you. And and then I started to think, wait a minute, I'm worried about those who are out there judging me preaching a message about judging.

And I had to repent for two things. My worry number one, and then my judgment of you before I stepped into this space. So here we go. Matthew chapter seven is where we're going to be and John chapter seven. John 7:24, we're going to start with Matthew 7, verses 1 through 5. And traditionally, this is, right, this is called the sermon on the mount.

And in this context of the sermon on the mount, God is calling his people to a higher standard. Not more righteous deeds by human effort, but more righteous hearts by divine grace. God like Jesus is telling us in these scriptures, there is a better way to live. Actually, five or six times in the sermon on the mount, He says this, you have heard that it was said this, but I say to you this, there's a better way. You've heard that it was said this, tradition or what the Pharisees are after. You've heard it said this, but I say to you this, there's a better way to live and it all has comes down to our heart.

And that's really this whole idea of judging and judgment, where where does that land? It's our heart condition. So let's read these first five verses of Matthew chapter seven. Judge not that you be not judged, for with the judgment you pronounce, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, let me take the speck out of your eye when there is the log in your own eye? 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.

Point number one, in order to be in the right place with the Lord, an eye exam is required. In order to be in the right place with the Lord, an eye exam is required. And we see this in verse three, why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? How many of y'all have been to the eye doctor lately? Okay, just a okay, a good percentage of us. Look, there's two things about the eye doctor that I absolutely despise. Why do they do this? I don't know. The first, the first thing is this glaucoma test. They put you in front of this like metal cage looking thing. It's like some kind of torture device.

And they're like, okay, first what we want you to do, put your chin on this ledge, so you're already reaching out your neck, right? And then we want you to place down your forehead, like lean in, and then we want you to open your eye as bright as you possibly can, and we're going to hit you with a big huge squirt of air. The first time I had this happen, the eye doctor was like, it's just a little puff. It's not a big deal. I like almost fell over behind the seat. They crank the air on that thing. It was like they were putting air in my tires in my car, my truck. Boom! Why do they feel it's necessary to do that? And then they take you to this room, right? It's dark. So you're already like, what's going on? Take you to this dark room, and somebody thought it was really grand to go ahead and put chemicals in your eye to make your your pupils dilate. You look like a cartoon character, right? Your pupils are like this big. It's so that we can see and we can we can check everything out.

I don't know if your eye doctor does this, but mine does. She takes this like little prism looking thing. It's like from the sun. They like beam the light through that. She's like, I got to take a look at the backside. How do you look at the backside of your eye with this thing? And she's shining this thing and then how was she goes, how was that? I don't know, I can't see anything now. Why do we have this in our life, right? It's a detailed exam to make sure that our eyes are healthy. Yes, to find out if there's different things going on, maybe they can catch something ahead of it, but if it's to see if you're healthy. Jesus is calling us to this place. This isn't the first time in the sermon on a mount that He that He talks about the health of your eye. In Matthew 6:22 and 23, he says, the eye is the lamp of the body. So if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness.

We have got to have an eye inspection. Because a lot of times we're pointing out things, specks in other people's eye and we got a gleaming log in our own eye. Your eye is what you focus on. Your perception and it even at times dictates your attitude. You must evaluate you.

Jesus tells us who to judge right at the gate. The finger points right back here to me first. We have to evaluate where we are and what's happening. It's a picture for us of where we stand with the Lord and it should expose things in our life that we need to get corrected and we need to fix. The picture points right back at us. The previous church I served in, I was a student pastor and I I got to I got to preach like I do here as the discipleship pastor. I preached five or six times throughout the year in our our as a part of our teaching team. And it was the same the previous church I served in. Five or six times a year, I preached one Sunday and the following Sunday I was down front talking with uh some of our folks, our church family and just just talking about the day and uh we had a a guy come up to me and he said, hey, I I need to speak to you. And I said, okay. All right, let's step over to the side. He said, man, I I just I just want you to know, I need to ask I need to ask forgiveness.

And I said, oh, okay. It's kind of elevated the conversation. I stepped aside and I just said, what what's what's going on? What's happening? And he said, I've had these like preconceived things that I've been taught in my life, and I got to I got to get them fixed. And I judged you last week. I could not even listen to what you had to say and the Lord corrected my heart. And I said, well, why? What's what like what was that? What's going on? I'm I'm really curious. And he said, my y'all, I thought he was joking. My mom and dad taught me, beware of the bearded preacher. I I chuckled, you're serious. Oh, you're serious.

He said, I I had what God showed me is I had this like preconceived judgment going on. Where where his parents got that? I don't know. But that's what happens with us sometimes, right? Family of origin issues, our experiences, our circumstances come in our way in front of what God's word has to say. And the next thing you know, we're pointing fingers at people instead of looking at the big log that's in our eye. And I realized in that moment, like, wow, this this guy has a a serious issue. We prayed, got over, and I still have a beard. Okay. Because Jesus had one too, by the way. Okay, sorry.

The second thing is this, that in this in this scripture text, Jesus is not forbidding that we evaluate our brother and their spiritual condition. So he's saying first, we got to look at ourselves, right? We got to look internally to what's happening, what's going on in our life, but he's not forbidding that we evaluate our brother, our sister. We just have to do it in the right way. We'll get to that in a minute, but look at verse 3, 4, and 5, right, your brother's eye, to your brother, your brother's eye. The the understanding here is this. Jesus is forbidding the severely critical, fault-finding and habitually disposed individual that condemns others while promoting self-righteous and legalistic behavior.

However, He also demands the exercise of moral and theological discernment within the body of believers. And He illustrates this as He continues on in Matthew chapter seven. I don't know about you, but I thank God for spiritual giants in my life. Who had enough courage to pull me aside and speak the truth to me. And that's what we're going to talk about here. We're called to speak excuse me, we're called to speak the truth to one another. And I'm thankful that I've had those individuals that were in in my life as hard as it may be. As difficult as it is, they evaluated themselves. They took a look at their life. And then they came to me in the right way. And they said, hey, James, we got to sit down and have a conversation. We got to talk about things that you've maybe done or said. And the first step is to speak to your brother or your sister in Christ, to go to them. Is another term I've learned since I've been in Tennessee. You don't go to your mama and them. First. You don't go to your neighbor, your co-worker, your boss, you go to that individual.

And what keeps us from receiving that, right, pride, arrogance, all of those things. But we have to equip the saints, right? We have to equip one another for not only good works and ministry, but to live rightly. Look what Ephesians 4:12-15 says. To equip the saints for the work of the ministry. Now repeat this, for what?

Guest (Male): Upbuilding.

Jason King: Say it again.

Guest (Male): Upbuilding.

Jason King: Building up the body of Christ until we all attain to the what? The unity, the what? The unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature, what's that word again?

Guest (Male): Maturity.

Jason King: Mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. So that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.

Rather, speaking the truth in love. We are to grow up. Everybody say grow up.

Guest (Male): Grow up.

Jason King: In every way into Him, who is the head into Christ. Speaking the truth in love should produce these things. One, the building up of others. Everybody say building up.

Guest (Male): Building up.

Jason King: We've got to build each other up, not tear each other down. And this happens over and over and over when judgment comes into the into the place. Whether we we think we're justified or not, there's a lot of tearing down that happens in the church of Jesus Christ. We ought to not be marked by that. We ought to be marked by unity. And he says that right here, unity. Unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God.

To maturity. Everybody say maturity.

Guest (Male): Maturity.

Jason King: It takes a mature person to receive that from somebody else, doesn't it? Because what often happens when someone comes to us with something and they like, I love you, I care about you, I'm coming to you, I need to share this with you. I need to speak the truth and love to you. What happens all the time? Boom! Wall goes up right in front of us, doesn't it? And we want to defend our actions and our words and or even our intentions. But we are to grow up in every way into him. The sense of this maturity, a sense of taking that next step in our faith and growing and letting the body of Christ minister to us and help us. Speaking the truth in love brings about deeper relationship that builds up, is unifying in faith, produces maturity. And if what you're about to say does not do those things, you might want to take a look at what you're about to say.

When we evaluate our brother or sister in Christ, we are called to show sincere love. We're called to show sincere love. You know, we don't often know what's going on in the background with a person. We don't know where they come from or what they've gone through or what they're dealing with in their life. And oftentimes we just jump to conclusions and we see something and then we begin to make a judgment, and then we we begin to point fingers. And then we feel justified and, ah, see, I told you so.

This uh, let me give you another illustration in my life. So I grew up with three older sisters. Y'all, I said three older sisters. I'm still healing from that. Okay, so. Three older sisters. One of them came to visit me. We were at my parents' at one point and uh we realized we were missing some things from the store, so I said, I need to go out to the store and uh go grab these things. My sister jumped in the truck with me. We headed out. And we were laughing about how we grew up and good times and I pull in the parking lot in the grocery store and we're laughing and then she's hitting me like sisters often do to their brothers and pointing whatever and laughing. And I turn and look and like right at the corner was Kathy. Kathy was on staff at church with me at the time. And I saw her, you know what her face was? She had no idea that that was my sister, but she did know Karen, my wife. I immediately got out of the truck, and I I told my sister Angie, I said, hey, hey, come here. And we walked over to, Kathy, let me introduce to you my sister. And she just, Oh, this is going to be a harder conversation.

But we do that, don't we with things? We see things, we see people, we see situations, and we jump to conclusions. We step in that it's so easy to step in that space of being judgmental and pointing the finger when we should not be and we should realize there's a bigger, bigger picture. What are all the facts? Let me collect all the facts. Let me see what's happening and going on. You know, what we also don't know what God is doing in another person's life. And someone may be going through a huge situation that God is leading them through or what even God has in store for them for their future. And often what happens is we see things and remember the worst in others, and we even create a detailed list and keep it in our back pocket. We do this, and scripture says something different.

I mean, first Peter 1:22 says, we must show sincere love to each other as brothers and sisters. It's not optional. John Stott, the theologian and author, writes this, this command from Jesus to judge not is not a requirement to be blind to others in their faults, but rather a plea to be generous to others in their faults, faults with sincere love. Generous to others in their faults. We don't turn aside when something's wrong or bad or disruptive, but there's a right way to do things. There's a right way to have a conversation with someone. And so often we jump to conclusions and we're in that space of the wrong space of judgment. And there's a right way to do things.

Look at John 7:24, the other passage that I want to allude to uh today. Do not judge by appearance, but judge with right judgment. But judge with right judgment. There's a right judgment. There's a right way to have this conversation. We got to go to our brothers and sisters first. And then we have to have the conversation, but the heart behind all of this has to be shaped. It has to be shaped by what God is doing in our life. Right judgment requires us to see through the lens of grace and mercy. We don't give grace and mercy like we should. Peter was having a conversation with Jesus in Matthew chapter 18. I'm going to read these 10 verses because it's such a powerful illustration for this. Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his servants. When he began to settle, one was brought to him, who owed him 10,000 talents. Y'all, that's a big sum of money. It's a lot of money. And since he could not pay, his master ordered him to be sold and his wife and children and all that he had and payment to be made. So the servant fell on his knees imploring him, have patience with me, and I will pay you everything. And out of pity for him, the master of that servant released him and forgave him the debt. I mean, what a beautiful picture of the gospel, right? He forgave him the debt, all all gone. But when that same servant went out and found one of his fellow servants who owed him 100 dinari, vast difference in the amount of money, and seizing him, he began to choke him, saying, pay what you owe. So his fellow servant fell down and pleaded with him, have patience with me and I will pay you. He refused and went and put him in prison until he should pay the debt. When his fellow servant saw what had taken place, they were greatly distressed as I would be too. And they went and reported to the master all that had taken place. Then his master summoned him and said to him, you wicked servant, I forgave you all that debt. Because you pleaded with me, and should not you have mercy on your fellow servant as I had mercy on you.

We have to have grace and mercy. The right way to do things is showing grace and mercy. Why? Because God did that for us. Because He did that for us. I don't deserve the grace and mercy that Jesus has given me. I don't. I'm a sinner, just like you. And Jesus went to the to the cross. Bearing its shame, right? Gave his life for us, poured out his life for us. As an example for us. Additionally, right judgment requires us to see through the lens of forgiveness. Colossians 3:12 and 13 says this, put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Bearing with one another, and if one of you has a complaint against another, forgive each other as the Lord has forgiven you. So you also must forgive. Oftentimes, right, judgment happens when we have a complaint against another person. They've done something against us, something has happened and we begin complaining, and oftentimes what happens is it begins to compile, right, and build up and build up and build up and build up. And the next thing you know, we have an unforgiving spirit, and we're not expressing that to our brother, our sister in Christ. And we're just judging. One right thing right after the other. It consumes us. God forgave us. We need to be forgiving. Right judgment requires us to see through a lens of gentleness. Galatians 6:1 says this, brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted. Lest you too be tempted, right? I've got a log in my eye, but yet I'm going to point out the speck in somebody else's eye. But we've got to deal with that log. It's a it's a silly picture, isn't it? I mean, Jesus is a carpenter, is using terms that he's used to using. Right, there's a log, there's a speck. No doubt as a as a carpenter you got a speck in his eye at some point. It's really irritating, isn't it? And we need help. We need somebody to come alongside of us. And help get that speck out, but we need that person to be gentle with us. If they're not gentle, they're going to scrape our eye. We got to go back to the eye doctor, which is terrible. Restore him in a spirit of gentleness.

We carry the ministry of reconciliation. We carry that with that that's that's part of what we get to do as believers, to be gentle with our brothers and sisters in Christ. But often we are not gentle at all. We are judgmental and we attack and we attack. Why? Because we want it right or we want it our way? But we're called to be gentle with each other. I need you to be gentle with me. I mess up all the time. I need that in my life. The spirit of gentleness. Why? Because Christ is gentle with us. He's gentle. Right judgment requires us to see through a lens that builds others up. Romans 14:19 says this, so then let us pursue what makes for peace and for mutual upbuilding. For peace and mutual upbuilding. To build each other up. Not tear each other down. But to build each other up. That's something that the church should be marked by. We build each other up. We're going to we're going to speak the truth in love. And sometimes those are really hard and challenging conversations. And I don't think that we need to steer away from those. I don't. I think we need to have harder conversations at times. And this is what makes our faith so difficult because the Lord doesn't want us to sit back and just be accepting of other people's faults or the church's faults. We don't need to look that way, right? We don't need to be accepting of every behavior that happens. But we need to do things with gentleness, with compassion and love and care and grace and peace and forgiveness. Helping each other take next steps in their life, to build each other up so that so that we are a strong group of believers, who love Jesus and want to win this community for the sake of Christ.

And some of the hardest conversations I've had in my life, I needed those hard conversations. I didn't want to have them. I did not want to have them. But my brother and sister who loved and cared for me came to me in those gentle moments and said, hey, let's sit down and let's talk. Christ is not forbidding us to have hard conversations. He is forbidding us to not have that judgmental spirit. That just says, I'm going to be my way. This is all of what Jesus was talking about in the sermon on the mount. You've been taught this, you've been taught this, hey, there's a better way and it all begins with me. It all begins with the condition of my heart and where I stand with the Lord.

And I I think, I had to do it this week. This was one of those messages where I I thought, man, Lord, I you want me to do this? Okay. I had to have a eye exam this week. And I had to remove some logs out of my own eye. I had to take care of my soul, of my heart, so that I could be in a place to be used by the Lord. And I think what happens a lot of times is we we just we want to shy away. We just let that go away. Let's just push that aside. I don't I don't want to think about that. I don't want to deal with that. But we need to have that conversation first with the Lord.

So let's do that today. In just a minute. Our prayer team is going to come up. They're going to be right down here. Ready to receive you. And I I thought this was such a challenging message in a response time. Because if I come forward for prayer, what's everybody else going to think? We got to deal with our heart. And if someone comes forward for prayer, they're asking the Lord for help. They're asking a brother or a sister for help. And what oftentimes happen, people don't come forward to this space. Why? Because they're afraid of what the church is going to judge them on. So we're going to practice this today. If you got something in your life that you need to lay at the feet of Jesus, grab that card in front of you and write it out and come lay it down on this platform. Come grab a brother or sister in Christ and say, I need help. I got to fix this. I got stuff in my life that I need to go that I need to deal with. I need to I need to lay this at the feet of Jesus. Let's help one another. Let's love one another with gentleness and kindness.