1 Corinthians 4:5

"So don't make judgments about anyone ahead of time--before the Lord returns. For he will bring our darkest secrets to light and will reveal our private motives. Then God will give to each one whatever praise is due." 1 Corinthians 4:5 (NLT)

Just another expanded version of "Do not judge" (Matthew 7:1, Luke 6:37), but it really got me thinking about judgment. I must say, it's always been a command that I've had trouble wrapping my head around, let along following. "Do not judge"--what are we supposed to do about sin, then? Ignore it? I'm often told to condemn the sin without condemning the sinner. How do you do that in real life? What's the Biblical precedent for that? (for instance, maybe Jesus refusing to condemn the adulterous woman for her adultery by throwing a stone at her but still being willing to tell her to stop sinning? See John 7:53-8:11) I used to often wonder how a loving God could condemn us for our our sin, but I think now that he loves us too much to allow us to destroy ourselves through sin, and that He hates sin too much to allow it to go uncondmened (and perhaps unpunished?). And what about yourself? May you judge yourself? How do you know what you're doing wrong if you don't think about it and judge yourself? OK, that question is actually rather simple--God tells you. And right before the verse above, Paul says, "I don't even trust my own judgment on this point. My conscience is clear, but that doesn't prove I'm right. It is the Lord himself who will examine me and decide" (1 Corinthians 3-4, NLT). Even with ourselves, we can't judge well; we must allow God to do it.

Ultimately, we are not to judge because only God can know what's in a person's heart, what they've experienced, why they did what they did. Only He knows whether a person had the right motives, maybe even whether they sinned or not. After all, God may forbid me to do something but not forbid it to someone else. And that's what Paul is saying in this verse.

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I read that verse in 1 Corinthians early in the day, before I went to work at my new job. I feel like God was trying to warn me, and I unfortunately just didn't heed His warnings at all. I went to work. There are two groups of workers, half of which look really punk, weird, whatever. The other half looks more normal and acts more what I would call normal, with lots of joking and whatever. I'm ashamed to say, I picked the normal half and almost ignored the other half. Then I started judging the "normal" half and how shallow they are. Lord, please forgive me. Please help me to act according to Your will tomorrow, not mine.

Also, I tried out a new Christian group and during the meeting this quote was brought up (it's from The Screwtape Letters by C. S. Lewis, which is a series of letters from one demon to another advising him about how best to tempt/destroy this man's soul and therefore send him to hell). Here, Screwtape is advising Wormwood about how to turn this man away from the church because of the hypocrisy/unpleasantness he sees or thinks he sees there. He writes, "All you then have to do is to keep out of his mind the question 'If I, being what I am, can consider that I am in some sense a Christian, why should the different vices of those people in the next pew prove that their religion is mere hypocrisy and convention?' You may ask whether it is possible to keep such an obvious thought from occurring even to a human mind. It is, Wormwood, it is! Handle him properly and it simply won't come into his head." (from the 3rd letter, if anyone wants to go look it up or read more). What a vital question to ask yourself when you start judging people: "If I, being what I am, can consider that I am in some sense a Christian, why should the different vices of those people in the next pew prove that their religion is mere hypocrisy and convention?" May I remember it more.