Why Am I So Judgy?

First off, I would like to go into why I am making this post about myself. This is a topic that I could easily have just gone with “Is Judging a Sin” as the title of it; however, while the topic is precisely that, I also felt the need to use this as a preemptive defense. 

You see, I am about to start another blog series. Up until this point I have only written about things that are general theological topics that Christians should know. I am going to start introducing blogs that will be much different. These blogs will be on false teachers, false prophets, and the teachings and prophecies associated with the false teachers and prophets. So, why am I writing this topic before I enter into these teachings? It is simple. I know that the first thing that will happen when I start writing about these things will be attacks from within the church. Especially the members of the churches that I will be putting in the spotlight. They will call me judgmental, judgy, pharisee-like, radical, unforgiving, un-Christlike, and whatever other words they can think of. A few of them might try to use Scripture to back themselves up. Therefore, this is my preemptive biblical defense of my actions and words. 

The first—and possibly most important—thing to look at is if judging someone is, in fact, a sin. If I were to ask whether judging is a sin, most Christians (including myself not so many years ago) would have said, “Absolutely!” So, the very first thing that I need to show is the truth on being “judgy.” Let’s start by asking a question: Is judging a sin? The answer? Yes and no. It all depends on what you mean by judgement. To begin, let’s look at judgement that would be sin. 

Imagine that you are at a restaurant. In walks a man who is dressed impeccably in a suit. The greeter of the restaurant hurries over and, with all courtesy, seats the man. He is almost immediately waited upon. A couple of minutes later, another man enters the establishment. This man is dressed in oily clothes. Not rags, but he was clearly working on a car or something similar prior to coming to eat. The greeter sees the man gives a look of disgust and raises a finger signaling the man to wait. After a minute or so the greeter meanders over and seats the man, all the while wrinkling his nose at the smell of oil. And it takes five minutes for a waiter to come to help him. As you watch these exchanges, you notice something. The man in the suit is abrupt and rude in all his dealings with any of the staff, while the man in the oily clothes is kind and takes no offense at the lateness of the staff in helping him. You have an intense desire to commend the man in oily clothes and a desire to rebuke the man in the suit. 

Who judged righteously, the staff or you? It is obvious that the staff judged based on exterior things. This is wrong. This is evil. This is sin. You, on the other hand, judged based on character and whether their actions are righteous.  This is good. This is right. But were you nice to the staff regardless of their reaction to you? For this is important in judging anyone. First judge yourself. Then and only then can you see well enough to judge the actions of others. 

But Logan, doesn’t the Bible say “’Judge not, lest you be judged’ in Matthew 7?” Indeed, it does. But this is one of the most abused passages in Scripture by Christians and non-Christians alike. If this verse is used by itself, it has lost what Jesus was talking about. Let’s look at the whole passage Matthew 7:1-5 says,

Judge not, lest you be judged. For with the judgement 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 a 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.

What do you see here? You do see the idea of not judging, however, there is more to it. Look at the verses below. Jesus doesn’t say to not take the speck out of your brother’s eye. Rather, He says to make sure that your eyes are clear first. Then, take the speck out of your brother’s eye. Almost all of the rest of chapter 7 talks about judging people based on their actions. But I won’t get into that yet. 

Let’s look to another verse. In John 7:24, Jesus says,

Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgement.

This one is never used to argue that judging in sinful for some reason. It’s probably because it doesn’t teach a false teaching that judging is bad. It is clear. Judge not according to appearance. Rather, judge righteously. This is a command by Jesus himself to judge in a righteous manner. 

There are several more verses to look at. The first is when Jesus was anointed at the pharisees house by a sinful woman in Luke 7:41-43. In these verses Jesus is at a pharisees house (his name is Simon), and Simon takes offense at Jesus allowing this sinful woman to touch him. Instead of being embarrassed that He had allowed this woman to touch Him, Jesus instead asked Simon a question. He said,

“A certain moneylender had two debtors. One owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. When they could not pay, he cancelled the debt of both. Now which of them will love him more?” Simon answered, “The one, I suppose, for whom he cancelled the larger debt.” And He said to him, “You have judged rightly.”

Again, Jesus points to rightly judging as being something good. He repeats this again in Luke 12:57 and John 7:24. 

What about the rest of the New Testament? Is righteous judging still shown as a good thing? This is an emphatic, yes. James passes judgement in Acts 15:19 in regard to whether Gentiles should be yoked with circumcision and the law of Moses. Romans has a pretty consistent theme that we should not judge each other, but again the type of judging that goes on is what matters. What is interesting though in regard to Romans is that it is written by Paul. Paul also wrote 1 Corinthians 5:12-13, in which he says,

For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge? God judges those outside. “Purge the evil person from among you.”

1 Corinthians 5 is quite a harsh chapter. Paul is rebuking the church at Corinth for tolerating and even boasting about sexual immorality. But not just any sexual immorality, there were men among them who were sleeping with their moms. To which Paul tells the church to “purge the evil person from among you.” That is a judgment if I’ve ever seen one. This is immediately followed up by 1 Corinthians 6:1-3:

When one of you has a grievance against another, does he dare go to law before the unrighteous instead of the saints? Or do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases? Do you not know that we are to judge angels? How much more, then, matters pertaining to this life!

Does Paul then contradict himself? Of course not! It all matters how we go about judging.

There are also those who say that Jesus did not, and does not, judge anyone, but this is false. From what I can tell, this comes from a couple of verses. The first is John 3:17, and the second is Matthew 7:1, which we already addressed. Yet, there are many verses that testify to Christ passing judgment on people. John 5:22 says,

For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son.

Not only that, but in John 9:39, Jesus said,

For judgment I came into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind.

These verses show that Jesus is the judge. But you can look at most interactions that Jesus had with someone and see that He does pass judgement. For example, when He says, “go and sin no more,” that is a judgement. He is saying that what the person is doing is wrong and needs to stop doing it.

Let’s get back to Matthew 7. I highly recommend going and reading the entire chapter. I expect that it will be enlightening on the topic of judging others. Anyway, Matthew 7 is one of the passages that Jesus talks about false prophets. He tells us how to recognize them. In verses 15 and 16, he says,

Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits.

Jesus says that many false prophets look like real prophets, but in order to see them for what they are, we must judge their works.

One of the more interesting things that I have found about this topic is that many who call out others as being judgmental do so without realizing that they themselves judge others. In fact, the very act of telling someone that they are being judgmental is a judgement. Our entire Christian walk is based on the judgement that God is right, and the world is wrong. That humans are sinful creatures who need Jesus to save us.

This is not an exhaustive look into what it means to judge righteously, but I hope that you can see that Scripture is clear that judgement is not sinful in and of itself. Rather, it is sinful when we don’t examine ourselves first and judge incorrectly based on outward appearances. Therefore, go and judge righteously.

As always, feel free to contact me with any questions at ljandersonbooks@outlook.com.