Tag Archives: judging

Search for what is right and just (John 7:21-24), February 12, 2017

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Today’s Podcast


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  1. Thanks for joining me today for “A Little Walk with God.” I’m your host Richard Agee.
  2. The man walking across the street toward his Harley with the wild looking beard, is wearing leather pants and jacket with metal studs. He has black boots and a red, white and blue rag wrapped around his head. He looks a little rumpled and dirty like he just climbed out from a trash heap. He’s wearing dark wrap around glasses so you can’t see his eyes. What’s your first reaction?
  3. Scripture
    1. John 7:21-24
    2. Jesus:  Listen, all it took was for Me to do one thing, heal a crippled man, and you all were astonished.  Don’t you remember how Moses passed down circumcision as a tradition of our ancestors? When you pick up a knife to circumcise on the Sabbath, isn’t that work?  If a male is circumcised on the Sabbath to keep the law of Moses intact, how can making one man whole on the Sabbath be a cause for your violent rage?  You should not judge by outward appearance. When you judge, search for what is right and just.
  4. Devotional
    1. The man I described earlier is a friend of mine. He’s a pastor and the scene comes from a picture one of the members of his Christian motorcyclist club took of him when they stopped for a break on a cross country trip one day. They travelled a lot of dusty roads that day and with twenty or so bikes churning up the dust on those back roads, everyone looked like they just came out of a trash heap.
      1. Great time riding
      2. Worshiping
      3. Fellowshipping
    2. We have a tendency to stereotype
      1. Part of our DNA
      2. Quick judgments originally to protect us
      3. Lion or rock
      4. Friend or foe
      5. Welcomed or attacked
    3. Carried those early survival requirements into modern society
      1. Clothes
      2. Hair and makeup
      3. Color of skin
      4. Religion
      5. Nationality
      6. Political views
      7. Whatever is different causes us to mark others as enemies and resort to fight or flight because of Satan’s lies
    4. Jesus warns, “You should not judge by outward appearance. When you judge, search for what is right and just.”
      1. How do we do that?
      2. First, ask for discernment
      3. Second, recognize God made us all
      4. Third, recognize Satan has blinded most and they will not judge according to God’s rules but by the world’s
      5. Fourth, don’t let others judgment and attitudes keep you from demonstrating God’s love and grace toward them
  5. If you want to learn more about my church, you can find us at SAF.church. If you like the devotional, share it with someone. If you don’t, tell me. I hope you’ll join me again tomorrow for “A Little Walk with God.”

The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved. In accordance with the requirements for FTC full disclosure, I may have affiliate relationships with some or all of the producers of the items mentioned in this post who may provide a small commission to me when purchased through this site.

A good way to live (Luke 6:37-38) October 5, 2016

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Today’s Podcast

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Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Psalms 117-118

see the whole year’s plan [here](http://www.bible-reading.com/bible-plan.pdf)

Today’s Devotional

Luke 6:37-38
Jesus: If you don’t want to be judged, don’t judge. If you don’t want to be condemned, don’t condemn. If you want to be forgiven, forgive. Don’t hold back—give freely, and you’ll have plenty poured back into your lap—a good measure, pressed down, shaken together, brimming over. You’ll receive in the same measure you give.

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

Man, it’s easy to condemn other people for their actions, isn’t it? My church obviously has it right when it comes to the way we do Christianity. Those other denominations miss the boat. And those on the outside, wow. Look what they do. And the independents, let’s not even start with those, they don’t even ascribe to any particular historic theology. They just believe what they interpret from scripture for themselves. They are obviously on the wrong track.

I hope you hear the sarcasm and don’t think I’m serious about those last few sentences. Unfortunately, as the world looks in on us, that’s what they see and hear too often when they look at the Christian community as a whole. We don’t worship the same, we don’t act the same, we don’t believe the same way, we hold different things important, and then when we get together we fight instead of getting along in worship of the same God and Savior, Jesus Christ.

But that’s not the kingdom way. We have one judge, Jesus. The only One who can condemn is the sinless One, Jesus and He forgives when we accept His forgiveness. So why do we judge and condemn and fail to forgive? Why is it so hard to follow Jesus direction in this regard?

I think it goes back to our trying to earn our way into heaven. We want to do something with the problem that plagues all humanity, sin. So we try to be as good as we can. We try not to steal or lie or cheat. We usually don’t murder or commit adultery or commit other crimes against each other that would put us in jail. But we know deep within our heart that we are not good enough to make it to heaven.

So what we do, is subconsciously figure that God will want to take at least some of us, so if we can be better than the person next to us, we’ll be okay. It’s like the reasoning when camping in bear country. You don’t have to be able to outrun the bear to survive, just the person sitting next to you at the camp fire. Let the bear catch them instead of you.

But there is a problem with that thinking when it comes to the judgment. God’s will is that all of us be saved and join Him in heaven. We are the ones that choose our destiny. And the choice is not by our good or bad behavior because none of us can ever be good enough. God never compares us with each other. That would be like using whatever I might guess is a mile using nothing but my eye as the length of a mile and measure it against what someone else thinks is a mile. God is never that imprecise in judging good and evil. And He already has the correct standard to judge us against. The standard is His son, Jesus, the God/Man.

So how do you measure up to the God/Man, Jesus? He was sinless. That puts all of us way below the standard. You see, every other person is far removed from God because a single sin separates us from Him. He is holy and will not allow sin in His presence. So when measured against the sinless One, we all far short. We all miss the boat. We all deserve the penalty of death. But then God turns to His Son and for those who believe in Him as their redeemer, He finds the sin is gone, forgiven, thrown away as far as the east is from the west never to be remember against us again.

How can we judge when we are so far from God except for God’s love? How can we condemn when we are ourselves condemned except for His forgiveness? How can we not forgive others when He has forgiven us so much and allowed us to come into His presence. How can we not give when He has given us so much?

When we do those things, Jesus gives us a great promise with it. When we forgive, we will find forgiveness, when we give, we will receive in great measure. In fact, I think of being given in measure like brown sugar. You can either pour sugar in from the package and it kind of falls out in clumps and you get about half a cup when when you really want a cup full. Or you can mash it down as you fill the cup and get two or three times as much in the cup as when you just try to pour the brown sugar in. That’s how God gives back, shaken down, smashed in like brown sugar, filled to over flowing.

Sounds like a good way to live, doesn’t it? 

The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.
In accordance with the requirements for FTC full disclosure, I may have affiliate relationships with some or all of the producers of the items mentioned in this post who may provide a small commission to me when purchased through this site.