Last night in Pioneers, after commander Ken finished reading the Sermon on the Mount, one boy asked if it was wrong to be a judge (i. e. in a courtroom). Good question. Sometimes it takes more than one Scripture on a subject to understand what God means. God gave Solomon wisdom so that he could judge Israel wisely as the highest human judicial authority in the land. Proverbs makes several references to such judging, and doing it with righteousness. Other places in the New Testament admonish us to make certain judgments concerning who we fellowship with and concerning our own behavior. Indeed, Jesus admonished us to beware of false prophets and to inspect the "fruit" of their lives in the very same sermon. So what was Jesus really saying? "Judge not, that you be not judged. For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. And why do you look at the speck in your brother's eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye? Hypocrite! First remove the plank from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye." -- Matthew 7:1-5 (NKJV) Taken in context, Jesus was obviously talking about the dangers of hypocrisy and being overly judgmental about others when we ourselves are not perfect. The kind of judgment that says, "Look at him, he's not very spiritual, because he smokes! Just consider how bad of a treatment of the temple of the Holy Spirit that is!" -- a statement that sounds really odd coming from the mouth of a person who is an obese glutton. In the mean time, the smoker may condemn the person with the eating problem between puffs of nicotine-bearing smoke, because he is actually in better health overall. In situations like that example, it would obviously be more productive for each person to give grace to the other fellow, while working on lining their own lifestyles and habits up with the Word of God. After they have kicked their own bad habits, then they will be qualified to actually help (instead of condemn) their brother. In some cases, it is very natural to want to join in and state your opinion on something, and this can easily degrade into the kind of hypocritical judgment that Jesus condemns. Resist that temptation. On the other hand, if you want to get a job as a judge, pray for wisdom and make sure that you always judge fairly in a way that you wouldn't mind being judged. I think the world could use a few more Christian judges. ___ Michael Paul Johnson aka Soaring Golden Eagle <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> http://eBible.org/mpj Rocky Mountain Outpost 207 New Creation Church Jesus Christ is Lord! If Jesus came back today, would you be READY? _______ To unsubscribe, send "unsubscribe rangernet" to [EMAIL PROTECTED] "Eat the hay & spit out the sticks!" RTKB&G4JC! Autoresponder: [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://rangernet.org
