Dangerous Scripture: “Judge not, lest ye be judged”

In playing basketball, if someone is trying to shoot a three point shot, a defender may run at them to make them uncomfortable so they won’t shoot.  It’s called “running them off the three”.  That’s what the phrase “judge not” has become in our culture, meaning “you can’t tell me I’m wrong because you aren’t perfect”.  It seems ironclad because, who’s perfect, right?  It comes from a verse in Matthew 7, and to use it this way totally distorts what Matthew 7 says..  

 

First, the word “judge” in Matthew 7 means to proclaim as worthless, something beyond our “pay grade” to do.  Telling someone that they are wrong is not sending them to eternal doom.  On the contrary, it implies that you think there is hope for them.  Simply never noticing wrong and saying “they’ll never change”, could in a sense be committing the very sin you are trying to avoid.  Do you want someone to just write you off as hopeless?  Me neither.

Practical questions if this is how you use this Scripture:

• How would that work if no one could ever tell anyone else they are wrong without perfection?  
• What about, say, a murderer?  Do they get an out with the “don’t judge” defense?  Can no one look at their actions and determine them to be wrong until they themselves are perfect?  
• What if someone pointed out their bad direction and helped correct their behavior earlier, would they never have become a murderer to begin with?  In this culture's screwed up paradigm of "Don't judge", no one could confront the person earlier because they themselves aren't perfect.
• Do my actions make the act more or less wrong?  
• The rest of Matthew 7, where that Scripture comes from, gives you distinct ways to evaluate situations and people for sin in those areas, to determine if you should step in or if you should allow them to influence you..  Is that a joke?   

If you even use “judge not” on someone else, aren’t you a HYPOCRITE, since you are trying to correct someone, thereby "judging" them to be wrong and breaking your own advice?If you aren't a Christian, then shouldn't you just leave it alone, since you don't even believe the Bible to be true?  That’s nuts.

And so is this ridiculous way of using "Judge not, lest you be judged"...and TOTALLY not how it was ever intended to be used.  But, as gently as I can put it, this is what happens when the people who follow God and love Him rely on people who don't follow Him or are just surface readers of His Word to decide what a Scripture means...it's a gigantic mess, just like this phrase and how it's now used in our culture.

Matthew 7:5 presses the picture of removing the glaring sin (“plank”) from your own eye before you try to help remove the “speck” from your brother’s eye, because we are never to use someone else’s sin as a means to avoid our own.  We should always abandon our own sin.  Verse 5 gives us clarity on this point as to one reason for that goal.  “...Then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye.”  

One reason you are to keep your life as clean as you can is so that you can see clearly to help your brother/sister out of their damaging behavior.

The expected response after delivering the “judge not” phrase is to end the conversation, just giving each other “permission” to be wrong, but that’s not what the Bible instructs at all.  

The next time someone uses the phrase on you, be true to Matthew 7.  Ask them what is the sin they are referring to in your life.  If they pick their jaw off the floor and answer you, stop right there and confess that to God, apologize to them, if necessary and correct your direction.  Then, say, “Thank you, now let me help you with you sin as well.”  Speak the truth, but do it in love, not in arrogance or anger or revenge.  If you cannot act in humility and love, there is the first plank you should remove.  Trust the real Matthew 7, model humility and don’t let them run you off the three.