7:1-6Matthew 6:25-34 Worship Pastor Justin Taylor When Jesus says, “judge not”, He’s not talking about judgement in terms of discernment, making good decisions, or even matters of church discipline. He is talking about condemnation. Jesus doesn’t say, “be slow to judge”, or “you can judge as long as you’re right”. The New Testament authors are unanimous on this point, as far as believers are concerned, condemnation is completely out of bounds. We are not allowed to do it. It is a sin, which grieves the Holy Spirit. Condemnation is a legitimate form of judgment, but it’s the last one. Condemnation is final and without hope. Only God has the authority to condemn, and He has decided to wait for the last day! (2 Peter 3:15) Judgement is for restoration… not condemnation. 1 Corinthians 5:3-5 What is “condemnation”? Dallas Willard says, “When we condemn another, we really communicate that he or she is, in some deep and just possibly irredeemable way, bad-bad as a whole, and to be rejected. In our eyes, the condemned is among the discards of human life. He or she is not acceptable. We sentence that person to exclusion.” In other words, today we would say that the person or group is “cancelled”. This is the same thing that the Pharisees were doing in the day of Jesus. They were notoriously judgmental, and this is what Jesus was always addressing with them. The word “judge” means to discern, literally “to separate”. A judge discerns (or separates) truth from lies, innocent from guilty, etc. But what the Pharisees did was not simply separate sheep from goats, but they would separate between you and me. At the core, it was pride – they thought they were better than someone else. (Luke 18:9-11). This was self-righteousness. Instead of me standing alone before a Holy God, I stand together with you. I may not be completely innocent, but I’m innocent by comparison. You become the standard by which I justify myself. The Pharisees had a list of people like that…and most of us do as well. When we justify by comparison, it is hypocrisy. At the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus begins His message by blessing the very people the Pharisees were most inclined to judge. Jesus says to not be like them! Jesus is the One who will separate (Matthew 25:31-32), and He will do so precisely according to how we treat the very people we are most inclined to judge (the hungry, the thirsty, the foreigner, the stranger, the sojourner…) Jesus gives us a very practical way to avoid judging others. He says, “Whenever you feel condemnation coming on, just pretend it’s me, and treat them accordingly”. In essence, we are to love others well. Condemnation is without care. Love cares about your Christlikeness (1 Cor 13:4-6).