Judge Not

"Do not judge, and you will not be judged; and do not condemn, and you will not be condemned; pardon, and you will be pardoned. Give, and it will be given to you. They will pour into your lap a good measure--pressed down, shaken together, and running over. For by your standard of measure it will be measured to you in return." (Luke 6:37-38)

Judgment is usually indulged in when some wrong inside of someone else resonates with some similar root or fault in our own hearts. This text is simply an explanation of a universal principle, a law of reality, a truth that defines the way our minds naturally function.

If I judge someone, by doing so I am really exposing and amplifying the same or very similar fault in my own life. I am really giving notice to all around that I have the problem which I am accusing someone else of having. Even though I may re-label the issue so as to try to avoid detection myself, the very fact that it arouses intensity in my emotions betrays the fact that something is unresolved in my own heart and needs healing.

Therefore you have no excuse, everyone of you who passes judgment, for in that which you judge another, you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things. (Romans 2:1)

So when Jesus says that I should not judge if I do not want to be judged, part of the meaning of these words is that when I stop judging others I also stop judging myself; when I stop condemning others I stop feeding the atmosphere of condemnation that has surrounded my own heart and mind. Ironically, it may be found that we ourselves are the greatest source of the condemnation that we feel. We try to blame others for condemning us or think that God is making us feel condemned. But God says very clearly that He is not condemning anyone and even if others try to condemn us it is still our own choice as to what we will believe.

If condemnation from the outside resonates with self-condemnation on the inside, then it will feel so true that it will set up camp in our hearts and continue the destructive work of eating us alive from the inside out like a cancer. The true function of the real body of Christ is to create a safe, non-condemning atmosphere in which a person can once again breath and thrive in truth and grow in maturity. The true community of believers is to reflect for each other the true nature of God Himself who is never a source of condemnation.

We will know by this that we are of the truth, and will assure our heart before Him in whatever our heart condemns us; for God is greater than our heart and knows all things. Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God. (1 John 3:19-21)

This verse shows very clearly that one of the results of freedom from condemnation is confidence. Conversely, the effects of sin through condemnation is to rob us of our confidence. Notice also the double application of the first part of this verse that addresses both sides of our being, our left brain intellectual, logical side and then our right brain, heart-oriented side. Knowing and assurance come from both sides of our brain being in agreement and engaged in the process of restoration to wholeness and peace with God (salvation). We will be in growing agreement with truth and our hearts will also have more and more assurance which is just as important if not more.

Also note that this verse highlights what I pointed out before, that it is really our own hearts condemning us that is the real problem. When we find ourselves under the condemnation of our own heart it feels like we are hopelessly lost in slavery to our own deranged sinful flesh trying to hijack our spiritual experience. John tells us here that the way to get out of this desperate predicament is to choose to believe the superior authority of God in this matter and refuse to be sucked into the conclusions of our natural feelings. As our feelings are ignored in favor of real truth from God, they will soon change and begin to align more closely to our choices to believe real truth and then our own heart can be trained to no longer condemn us. The more we train our heart to not condemn ourselves the more confidence we will enjoy in our growing intimacy with our true Father and with fellow believers.