by Dex Bahr
Too many Christians are content to be a doormat for the world. Christianity is not an excuse for anyone to remain passive and non-judgmental regarding right and wrong and good and evil.
Unbelievers love to throw Matthew 7:1-2 in Christians’ faces to shame them.:
“Judge not, that you be not judged. “ (New King James Bible)
Bu was Jesus telling us not to ever judge? Many people , including Christians, take this verse out of context, assuming that it is not up to us to judge the actions of others.
Jesus says nothing of the sort. When you read further into the chapter you find this in verses 3-5:
“And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother,’Let me remove the speck from your eye’; and look a plank is 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.”
Clearly , Jesus is not restricting us from making judgments. However, He is telling us to first take care of our own sin before judging another’s sin.And if you needed further proof that Jesus is in fact telling us to judge, examine Matthew 7:6:
“Do not give what is holy to the dogs; nor cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces.”
Discerning just who are dogs and swine obviously requires judgment for that determination. Our Lord and Savior is teaching us that we don’t just share the Gospel willy nilly to just anyone. For instance sharing the Gospel in the middle of Satanic ritual or to a group of anarchists in the midst of a riot is bad judgment. Even Jesus was silent before His accusers during the night of a His arrest and later crucifixion.
When Jesus told us not to judge this was a warning not to be excessively critical and eager to point out the faults of others. Jesus is not telling us not to judge good and evil. If this were so , why would the God tell us to hate evil?
You who love the Lord, hate evil!
He preserves the souls of His saints;
He delivers them out of the hand of the wicked.–Psalm 97:10 (NKJV)
If we were not to judge, as the world is so quick to tell Christians, how can we discern truth versus deception? We can do so because we judge by the discernment given to us by God through the Holy Spirit. However, while we are to judge, our role is not condemnation. God tells to love our enemies for a reason: we were once enemies of God because of our sin. We can never forget that and we must remember that only God can make a final judgment on a person. That role is not for us as believers.
We can only stand in the truth of God because to stand in the truth of man is foolishness. The world hates the truth of God preferring , instead, to create its own reality: a reality comprised of lies and deception.
This only makes sense because to deny the truth of God is to lie to yourself. If you deny this basic truth in the face of all of creation speaking of God, then lies will corrupt every fiber of your being. We are seeing the fruits of this in the corruption of every institution that has provided the guardrails of our society. Look around. From marriage, to law, to education , to science and even to the Christian church, secularism in the form of politics has corrupted everything.
The truth of contemporary America and of Western Civilization is that lies have become the foundation of politics, philosophy and even morality. People have believed the lies that they are good people because they care for the environment, condemn racism and stand for social justice. They have been led to believe by the arbiters of pop culture that these are three of the biggest problems facing the world. Talk about deception of the highest order.
Yet, many churches have also bought into this deception. They have chosen to acquiesce to a culture that rejects truth instead of standing on the truth of the Bible and making a right judgment. This happens because too many Christians are preoccupied with disproving a negative that the world accuses them of (i.e. bigotry of homosexuals or being against a woman’s right to a abortion). This stems primarily from Christians having a fear of man rather than a fear of God.
Fear of man deludes Christians to prostrate themselves for cultural approval rather than standing for Godly Truth no matter who is offended . The truth is Jesus offends the culture. The Bible offends the culture and truth be told, even God offends the culture. And guess what? If you follow Jesus you should be offending the culture. If you are not, then a stark personal assessment is needed.
Yes we are to love our enemies, but we are to hate evil. Yes we are to render unto Caesar, but we are also to worship the Lord our God even when government commands us not to do so. We obey government but not at the cost of fellowship and worship.
The Christian Church is tasked with the mission of sharing the Gospel of the life, death , resurrection and return of Christ and that alone (Matthew 28:19; Mark 16:15-16; Acts1:8; Romans10:12-15). We are not called to validate sin or pervert the Word of God in the pursuit of riches.
Love is shown by speaking the truth, while appeasement is staying silent. Our current culture is a consequence of the too many churches choosing to remain silent about the rot infecting it because of a wrong belief about rightful judgment Time to reject the passive role of doormat to the culture and instead dedicate our selves to leading people the doorway of Jesus as as Lord and Savior.