Matthew chapter 7 verses 1 to 6. 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 the 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. Verse six, do not give dogs what is holy and do not throw your pearls before pigs, lest they trample them underfoot and turn to attack you. This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. Okay, so the whole service has been going this way, so I'm gonna say it. Man, I love that our worship service is not a show. This is not a Broadway show, right? We are here to worship, and I was praying that this morning. Lord, help us to worship. Let it not just be words spoken and words sung. Let it be genuine worship between Us and you, and so I just want to tell you that I, Jay and I were part of a little church when we were away from Trinity for a while, and everything seemed so perfect, it bothered me. I was thinking, this feels too perfect, every hair is in place, everything is just perfect, like it doesn't feel like church. Church is real people, real messed up people, real hurting people, sometimes you don't even want to be here, And then while you're here, God softens you and changes you and gives you the grace that you need. That's how church is. And I am glad that we are the church. And today's message is really a message about being the church. There's a hard passage. You know, one of the things about expository preaching, especially in our tradition, I don't want to say it's exclusive to our tradition, but Reformed churches tend to preach through the word expository. I'm not good at it. And that's why I just, Went to hear somebody and learn from somebody. And I like when I get to listen to Pastor Jeff or Richie or others, and we learn how to do this right. But here's a here's what I was getting at. When we do this rightly, we even come to passages that we don't want to preach. But we know we got to preach it because it's God's word and because it is the truth and we need it. This was a hard passage for me. Even this weekend, we had stuff going on in our house where I was thinking, man, I don't wanna preach this passage. This is a hard passage. Judge not, lest you be judged. Well, if you're a husband, if you're a dad, if you're a human, we are guilty of being people who are very, very, very picky about others and not so very picky about ourselves. And God has stuff to say about that because it's his kingdom and not ours, right? All right, let me pray for a minute, and then we'll jump into this. Thank you for your word. Thank you for our worship service, just as it is, Lord. It is perfect in your eyes if you are here, we are here, and we love you, and you love us, and we are yours in Christ. So my prayer from my own heart and everyone here is that you would give us eyes to see him a little better. And it's in Jesus' name we pray, amen. in worry, which is what we talked about last week. Worrying is wasteful. Anxiety doesn't do anything. It doesn't add height. It doesn't add length of time to your life. It's wasteful. It's folly, just as that is folly in this passage, that there is a folly in judging others. Do you judge others? Do you size people up? I'm from New York. Do you know what happens in New York? You're on the subway and someone's looking you over and like, I know you. They don't know you, but they think they know you. You know what I mean? People size you up by what you wear, how you look, what you say, maybe sometimes even before you open a mouth. You know, one person once said to me as I was visiting a church, I don't take this badly, it was just a comment, and I always remembered it, he said, you know, you speak pretty well. And I was kind of thinking, how did you expect me to speak? But you know, Maybe they didn't think that I could do it. You know, I mean, these are the kind of things that we do. We judge people by appearance, by maybe a comment or early impressions. But Jesus is teaching us a new way to live. That's what the Sermon on the Mount really is about, friends. It's about a new way to live. It's about a kingdom that has way different rules than what we set up humanly here on earth. You know, we might think this is how the house should be, the kingdom should be, the world should be. God says, it's my world, it's my church. This is how it should be. And so take to heart the Sermon on the Mount. There's a lot of things that we get wrong because we do it our way. And Jesus says, no, do it this way. And He has something to say about how we relate to one another. And that's what this sermon is all about. It's about being discerning about others, yourselves, in the church and outside the church. So going back to this thought about judging others, I came across several things that I wanted to kind of share with you. And one of those was an illustration. This is by a preacher named H.A. Ironside. Many of you have heard of him. He related an incident in the life of a man named Bishop Potter. Listen to this. He was sailing for Europe on one of the great transatlantic ocean liners, and when he went on board, he found that another passenger was supposed to share the cabin with him. And so he was a bit dismayed about that, and he went and checked it out, saw the accommodations, and then after some time, he came up to the purser's deck and inquired if he could leave his valuables, his gold watch and some of the other things in the ship safe. And then he explains that I don't normally do this. And I normally don't avail myself of this privilege. But he had just been to his cabin and he saw the man who was to occupy the other berth. And he said, judging from his appearance, he was afraid that he might not be a very trustworthy person. So he just wanted to put his belongings in the ship safe. The purser accepted the responsibility for the valuables and remarked, it's all right, Bishop. I'll be very glad to take care of them for you. The other man has been here before you and left his stuff for the same reason. You see what I mean when I say it's folly? You think you're sizing them up and they are sizing you up and you think you're better than them and they think they're better than you. And Jesus says, no one is good. Only the Father is good. Look at people through my eyes. You know, as I was thinking through the sermon, that's one thing that I was preaching to myself. Lord, give me eyes to see people the way you see people. Give me eyes to hear people the way you hear people. Help me not to misjudge people by appearance. Boy, there's so much stuff I can share here. Let me share one more with you. This is kind of interesting because I just went through the college process. There is two parents. Parents who whose son had just died before his 16th birthday, the president of Harvard University, and said, hey, we would like to set up a memorial for our son, our only son. And the man said, maybe a scholarship will do, because he had sized them up. They're very unpretentious. And he said, no. The mother said, no, I was thinking about something a bit more of a memorial like a building. And the man just brushed them aside and said, no, that's going to be way too expensive. Well, you know what? They didn't say a word. They left. And they had invested their money in starting a new college called Leland Stanford Junior College in California, which is now Stanford University. How funny that they brushed those parents aside so quickly because they didn't look the part. And yet, right? Listen, here, there is a warning that I think you're beginning to get, that we are to be very, very wise and discerning as we look at other people, look at ourselves and look at the world around us. Be careful in discerning about your judgments. And you know why Jesus is saying this? Because he is surrounded by his disciples, he is surrounded by his followers, and he is surrounded by a religious system and people called Pharisees who were the head of the religious system. And do you know what they did? They invented their own morality. They didn't care about God. They said they cared about God. They pretended to care about God. They talked as if they cared about God. But they invented their own system of morality. They made up their own rules. And think of the things that they did that became oppressively judgmental of other people. They condemned other people. They criticized other people. They were unmerciful, unkind, lacking grace in their constant criticism of everyone who didn't kind of meet up to their own standards, unforgiving. It was a man-made system that they made up so that they would look good, even though they talked about God all the time, right? And do you see why Jesus was so mad? I love it when Jesus gets mad in the scriptures, because he doesn't get mad at ordinary people. He doesn't get mad at the poor, and the weak, and the unknowledgeable, and the hurting. He gets mad at these people who think they know it all, and who think that they are so much better. And Jesus calls them out multiple times in the Sermon on the Mount, you hypocrites. You think that hurt them? Oh yeah, they hated him. In fact, that's why they wanted to kill him. We do this easily, don't we? I want you to think about this. This sermon could be two parts because it's so much there, but we do this so easily when we do that sizing up of people too quickly, but even when we do not realize where they've been and what they've been through, Or sometimes you don't even realize, you don't realize that they are young in the faith and they are just growing. Don't you sometimes look at other people like you should do better than that. You should know better than that. You quickly judge them, but you don't realize they are still drinking milk. They're still drinking spiritual milk in their walk with the Lord, in their journey. And maybe God has brought you far enough where you're eating meat, but we judge those people as if they should be where we are. Right? Do we do that? Do we do that in the church? We are tempted to pass judgment on others and write people off. And in fallen human beings like us, right, there comes this spirit of superiority when we look at people. We tend to think of people as better than us or worse than us or equal to us, where Jesus is saying, at the foot of the cross, the ground is level. I want you to remember that. At the foot of the cross, the ground is level. We are all standing there by the grace of God alone. So in the midst of the community of his followers, his disciples, Jesus is giving them these words to be patient and kind, but to be discerning. So I want to tell you, this is all about being wise and discerning as you look at others. And so we're going to look at a few points and let me point those out to you first, just so you have an outline. The first point is be discerning within the fellowship of believers. And under that is you're not the judge. Second point. Don't be hypocritical. Three, let iron sharpen iron. Okay, that's under point one. Point two is be discerning with those outside of the body of Christ. Be wise, but careful. Wise, but careful. And we'll look at some of those things together. So first, discernment toward fellow Christians. Judge not that you be not judged, for with the judgment 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 the 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. I wanted you to hear it again. You see, when you look at these verses, we often realize that they're misunderstood and misinterpreted, right? There are things that this does not mean. This doesn't mean that you can't have judges or courts. There are people who have said that. In fact, the great writer Leo Tolstoy thought that this meant that you cannot have any kind of court system amongst humans. And that Jesus is clearly saying that that is absolutely wrong. Right? In Romans 13, we see that God endorses biblical judges or judging rightly. Jesus doesn't mean that we can't use our intellect or our wisdom as we relate to other people. He's not telling us to not see people rightly or to understand what's happening around us. What he's telling us is, We're to use our God-given discernment to see people correctly, but there is a way to do that. Listen to this in John chapter seven. Okay, listen to this. Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment. Do you hear that? So he's not saying you cannot judge at all. We are given intellect. We are given the ability to understand what's going on around us and be discerning. There is a place and there is a time for that. But what he is telling us that we shouldn't do is that we shouldn't be people who are always looking for fault and being hyper critical of everything as if we are the judge or we are the one who's in control. Who made us judge? No one made us the judge. There is only one judge and that's God. Listen to this, Romans 14. For you to pass judgment on the servant of another, it is before his own master that he stands or falls, and he will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make him stand. F.B. Meyer, another great theologian, he said this. He said, do you realize that when you look at people, a brother or sister who may be in sin even, that there are several things that we do not know. First, we do not know how hard he or she tried not to sin. Secondly, we do not know the power of the forces that assailed him or her. We also do not know what we would have done in the same circumstances. Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another? It is before his own master that he stands or falls. First Corinthians. For I am not aware of anything against myself. This is the apostle Paul speaking, but I am not thereby acquitted. It is the Lord who judges me. Therefore, do not pronounce judgment before the time before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart. Then each one will receive his commendation from God. I remember hearing the story of the great evangelist John Wesley. John Wesley was a great evangelist. We have many of his hymns, right? There is a time where John Wesley was promoting a charity, and there is a man who in his eyes was miserly and covetous. And the man gave nothing. And so Wesley, in his rashness, criticized him openly because he thought he had plenty of money and was just a miser. And the man came to him privately and said, Mr. Wesley, for the last two weeks, I've been living on parsnips and water. I got converted. from being a dishonest man and I piles of debts that I owe people. And since I became a believer, I've been trying to reconcile those debts and show people that by the grace of God, I am no longer dishonest and I am paying back every penny to those people. But now I must refrain, I cannot give above my tithe. So he was tithing. But Wesley misjudged him and thinking this man is so miserly and covetous, he's just accumulating more and more. Do you see? We don't know what's going on in people's lives. Only God knows that, right? So point A under that is that we are not to be the judge. Secondly, Do not be a hypocrite. Remember, I pointed out that this is Jesus aiming this at the Pharisees as he says, you hypocrites. Many times he had called them hypocrites. They were so much more concerned about what people thought than what God thought, right? They were doing it out in the open and talking about God to be heard, to be seen. Is this ever true of us? People pleasers, people watchers, selfish, lacking true discernment and personal integrity, having a fear of man over a fear of God. And look at how Jesus explains it in the parable. He talks about, now think about this, Writers talk about this as being hyperbolic. Do you know what that means? It's exaggerated. So you're looking at the speck in your friend's eye when you have a plank, okay? In another translation, it says a log coming out of your eye. Can you imagine that picture? It's an exaggeration, right? It's hyperbolic. But Jesus is trying to show us something. It's an exaggeration to make a point that we're so quick to discover and point out the faults of other people and we overlook even bigger things in ourselves. Is that true of us? Man, it's so easy to see everything else in everybody else. It's so hard for us to take a look at ourselves and see that maybe we have not only the exact same faults, but maybe Worse than theirs is just that we tend not to look at ourselves. Do you guys remember Michael Jackson? Come on, people. Yes, I'm a boy of the 80s, the 70s, and the 80s. I remember this one hugely popular song that was on the radio waves, the videos, everything, MTV. It's called Man in the Mirror. Do you remember that song? Man in the Mirror. Now, I don't know the man's theology, but that song convicted me. That's common grace, isn't it? God can even speak to people through people who do not know him personally. Who knows if MJ did or not? But anyway, the song was all about having a look at yourself first in the mirror. before having a look at everybody else. I'm looking at the man in the mirror. Do you do that? By the way, if you just look in the mirror without talking to God first, you'll still see what you want to see. But when you are walking with the Lord, when you are in His Word, which is a mirror of our hearts, which is speaking to our hearts, and He does surgery through His Holy Spirit, He hits that one corner, that one button, that one spot that you never see. The Lord helps us to see who we are first, and then we'll have a totally different look at others. Maybe we start off the day that way. You know, that's why I chose that Psalm. Oh Lord, search me and know my heart. Try me and know my wicked thoughts is what the KJV says. See if there is any wicked way in me and lead me in the way everlasting. Maybe we should start our days like that and say, Lord, help me to have the eyes to see people the way you see them. But first, let me understand how you see me and how you have been merciful to me and how you've been gracious to me and how you have overlooked judgment. through your son and I am no longer condemned and Lord help me to be gracious in that way. First Corinthians chapter 11, listen to this. But if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged. That's the apostle Paul talking. If we judge ourselves truly, we would not be judged. Brothers, sisters, listen, we can, however, when we are dealing with others, speak the truth and warn and correct and admonish one another in love if we do that correctly. Thirdly, I'm gonna go quickly to iron sharpening iron. You know, It's an interesting thing when you study the passage, you do see that Jesus does care about the speck in your brother's eye. He's not saying don't warn your brother of the speck, right? He's not saying don't even encourage him to get the speck out. We are brothers and sisters in the Lord. I am supposed to care about you, you're supposed to care about me. I'm supposed to care about your children, you're supposed to care about my children. We are supposed to look out for one another. I think I've shared this with you guys. A young lady in college walked up to me in our college fellowship group and pointed out something I could not hear in myself that I was saying every single day in my language, in my speech. And she said, Jake, do you realize that you say this? And I took a step back and said, Suzanne, I never heard myself. Thank you so much for caring enough to take me aside lovingly as a brother and say, this bothers me when you say things like that, or when you say this word or this language. She cared enough to stop and speak to me and help me grow. That's how we are to be. We're supposed to be iron that is sharpening iron. Do your part in one another's lives. We are not called to just mind our own business, right? Leave everybody alone, do your own thing. We are not called to just mind our own business. We are called to be our brother's, what? Keeper. We are our brother's and sister's keeper. Listen to Matthew 18. If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. We are not called to be hypercritical, but when there is sin, when there is wrong, we are meant to go to one another. We are meant to speak the truth to them, to warn them against danger. By the way, do you remember that verse, Matthew 10, 16? It's one of my favorite verses. It says, be as wise as serpents and as innocent as doves. Have you ever read that verse? I often thought, why does Jesus tell us to be like snakes? Do you know what snakes are? Subtle, but always avoiding danger. Careful. The snake would knew what he was doing in the garden. He was subtle. He knew when to walk up, when to talk, all those kinds of things. And Jesus tells us that we are to be truthful and loving and know how to speak to them, when to speak to them about sins. And we want to be a church that loves the Lord and His word and is biblical. So both are needed. You do need to talk about your brother's speck. But first, what does it say? I love that it kind of gives us an order. First, look at yourself. Be discerning enough to look at yourself. Take the log out of your own eye, the plank, the beam that's coming out of your own lives and your own eye. Do that so then you can clearly see what's happening around you and your brothers, your sisters, your family members, your friends, your church. See, there's wisdom and discernment when you do it that way. He's not telling us to keep away from others, but to walk towards them. Do you want a picture of discipleship? Listen to Hebrews chapter 10, verses 24 and 25, and let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works. Not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another and all the more as you see the day drawing near. Now, every family is different. Every culture is different. Every society is different. Sometimes there's, you know, people who are like, you know what, I'm going to stay away for a while because I don't want to confront this problem. I don't want to see that person. I don't want to talk to that person. I don't want to do the hard work. So they stay away. That is not a picture of discipleship. The picture of discipleship is meet together, stir up one another, love one another, encourage one another, do life in front of one another, talk to one another. And when you do what Jesus says rightly, you look at yourself first, right? Hey, am I critical? Am I quick to point out faults? Am I the one doing all these things? And yet I'm going to those people and telling them that they're doing this and they're doing that. God shows us the order and the path and the timing and all of that to do right discipleship within the church. And then we don't have to hide from one another. We don't have to keep away from one another. Do me a favor, sometime when you have time, study all the one another passages in the Bible. You know, the ones that have those words one another, all throughout the gospels, but notice how it is here even in the book of Hebrews. Consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another and all the more as you see the day approaching. All right, my time is quickly, quickly coming to an end. So I'm going to add this second point, which is be discerning to the outside world. That was all towards us within the church. And by the way, is there enough application for us through this pandemic and everything else going on? The last election, Jesus is very, very wise in saying, hey, within the church, brothers and sisters, don't judge one another. Be discerning how you're looking at one another. Understand how I have accepted you. Understand the mercy and the grace that has been afforded to you. But be wise and be encouraging and speak the truth in love. Our mentor, Pastor Paul Settle, always used to say, You know how I do marriage counseling? You always tell the truth, but you always speak the truth in love. And when you do that, there's nothing you cannot say. When you speak the truth in love, there's really nothing that you shouldn't be able to tell the other person that they need to hear. The second point, that being discerning. with unbelievers. Be wise with the precious gospel that's been given to you. Listen to this. Do not give dogs what is holy. Do not throw your pearls before pigs, lest they trample them underfoot and turn to attack you. This is kind of a verse that's separated from the earlier verses, but it's there for a reason, because I think it's saying the same thing. Be alert here too. Be alert as you deal with unbelievers. But do you know how we're supposed to be with unbelievers? To those who are lost, we proclaim the good news diligently and lovingly, constantly share the love of God with them, be patient with them, be long-suffering with them, constantly talking about the Lord, right? But then I want you to know there are also times When people are so antagonistic against the word, so antagonistic against the Lord, I remember this in my own family. Every time we would do something spiritual, there were family members who had something negative to say about it. Oh, there they go again. Oh, there they go to another church thing again. They despised the church. They despised the gospel. They looked down on it. They're antagonistic towards it. And the Lord kind of tells us we need to be discerning when there are those who are always against, always opposing, always despising the precious things of the Lord. Is the gospel precious? Is the church precious? Is his word precious? I remember the first time I gave one of my boys something that was very expensive. And they took it to the airport. and had it in their backpack. And the guy said, sorry, dude, no pocket knives allowed. And so we threw away this expensive, that's happened to you, right? But I had thought, oh man, my boy's turning 10. I wanna give him this very special thing that got passed down to me. Sometimes I have to be discerning and say, is he ready for this? Is this the right person? Is this the right time? Is this the right atmosphere? And Jesus calls them dogs and pigs. Okay, can I say a word here? There are pets, and then there are wild dogs. Okay? There are pets and then there are wild hogs. Like the ones that lived in the outskirts of the city that ate garbage and there were mongrels and they were mean and wild and all of them. That's what Jesus is saying. He says, be wise who you are giving valuable things to. Like those pigs on the outskirts who aren't your domesticated pigs at home in your farm. Like those wild dogs out there. Do not throw your pearls before pigs lest they trample them underfoot and turn and attack you. Look at Acts 18. I'll give you these examples as I close. When Silas and Timothy arrived from Macedonia, Paul was occupied with the word, testifying to the Jews. Do you remember that Paul was a Jew and wanted his own countrymen to come to know the Lord more than anything else? He loved the Jewish people in the Jewish nation. He was occupied with the word, testifying to the Jews that the Christ was Jesus. And when they opposed and reviled him, he shook out his garments and said to them, your blood be on your own heads. I am innocent from now on, I will go to the Gentiles. Interesting, isn't it? Discernment, Acts 13, 46 to 49. And Paul and Barnabas spoke out boldly saying, it was necessary that the word of God be spoken first to you since you thrust it aside and judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life. Behold, we are turning to the Gentiles for the Lord has commanded us saying, I've made you a light to the Gentiles that you may bring salvation to the ends of the earth. And when the Gentiles heard this, they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord. And as many as were appointed to eternal life believed, and the word of the Lord was spreading throughout the whole region. I'm not saying don't spend your time often and again and again with unbelievers, but be discerning. There's a whole world around us, and the gospel is precious. The kingdom is precious, and the Lord wants us to be effective, and he tells us, know who you're talking to. Understand the grace of God. Understand that we are all unworthy, and be discerning. Be merciful and kind in all those things. As I close, can I just ask you a few words? Are we, can we be considered a church that's just so judgmental that people cannot fit in here? That we're so set in one way, one way of talking, one way of thinking. We believe and love the truth of the Lord Jesus, but he tells us to do that a certain way, the way of his kingdom and not our own. Are there people that you need to go to and talk to? Are there people that you have put off, that you have not dealt with, that you need to go and speak with? Maybe. Maybe there's some reconciliations that need to happen. But I want to remind you that the Lord is good and kind, and he wants us to be the church. And through Christ, we can be the church. We can bear up with one another and be gentle with one another. And at the same time, say, brother, I need to speak to you about something and help them grow. That's the beauty of the kingdom. I pray this is true for us. Let me pray for us. Lord, I thank you for this passage. Lord, help us to heed the warnings very carefully and that you may give us wisdom. Because you say, if you lack wisdom, ask it and I will give it to you. Father, thank you so much for loving us to give us this Sermon on the Mount and all that it says about our own hearts. Lord, would you be our judge? And would you at the same time enable us to be merciful as you have been merciful to us? We pray this in Jesus' name, amen.