Don’t Judge

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If you're human — like me — you probably have a tendency to judge others. You know, you size people up and quietly file them where they belong.

One of the big problems with this is, when you judge someone else, you step away from the one thing you were actually sent to do. Judging isn't the solution to the mess around you and it's more than likely part of the problem. It pulls your eyes off the mission and puts you in a seat that was never yours.

So let's look at Matthew 7:1–5:

"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? ... 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." (Matthew 7:1–5)

Here's What's Important to Know… When Jesus says "judge not," He isn't telling you to stop knowing what sin is or the difference between right and wrong. He's telling you to get out of a chair you were never meant to sit in.

There's a difference between seeing something clearly and handing down a verdict (that’s what judging is). Scripture calls the church see things clearly – to real discernment. Jesus tells us to judge with right judgment and Paul told the church to deal honestly with open sin. This isn't a call to go blind.

What Jesus forbids is the deeper thing — rendering a judgment on where a person stands before God. Reading their heart. Knowing  their motives. And knowing their eternal outcome. That verdict belongs to one Judge, and there's only room for one in that seat. The judging reflex pulls us off our actual calling — the one thing that heals — showing and speaking Jesus.

Think of It Like This… Picture a lifeguard who’s there for one reason: to watch the water and pull people out when they're going under.

Now picture a lifeguard who spots someone struggling — and instead of grabbing the rope, she starts calling out everything they're doing wrong. "Bad kick. Wrong stroke. Shouldn't have gone out that far." Every word might be true. None of it saves him. The lifeguard has a rope in his hand and he's using none of it. He's narrating the drowning instead of stopping it.

That's what judging does to us. It makes us think we’re helping when we’re missing the mark.

Three problems show themselves when we judge:

First, judging presumes to know things it can't possibly know. To render a verdict on a person, you'd need to see their heart, their motives, the end of their story. And of course, "man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart" (1 Samuel 16:7).

You don't know their spiritual condition. They might be a believer still shedding old patterns, or a mature Christian in a hard season — and if so, "he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion" (Philippians 1:6). God has already started that work, and He does not abandon it.

Or they might not believe at all yet — still being pursued by a patient God who has appointed a day for their calling that you cannot see. "The Lord... is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance" (2 Peter 3:9). You don't know if the seed's been planted, or if today is the day it breaks ground.

Either way, when you draw a conclusion, there's a real chance you're wrong — doubting a work God's already begun, or standing in the way of one you can't yet see starting. Judging also acts like the story's already over. Paul says, "Do not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes" (1 Corinthians 4:5). To judge now is to skip to the last page while we're still living in the chapter God calls the kindness that leads to repentance.

Second, judging forgets its own history. "We ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray... But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us" (Titus 3:3–5). The cure for a judging heart isn't trying harder to be fair — it's remembering you were once the one who needed mercy. That's why Jesus talks about the log and the speck. Judging can be a hiding place: if I keep the sin "out there," I don't have to look at what's in me. The scorecard I hold on you is a way of avoiding looking at myself.

Third, judging destroys the very thing we're here to build. A verdict ends the relationship as it should exist, even if you're still talking. Judging freezes a person at their worst moment, as if that's who they'll always be. Yet Paul says of the Corinthians, "And such were some of you. But you were washed" (1 Corinthians 6:11). Were. That word is the whole hope of the Christian life. Judgment treats people as finished; the gospel treats them as being remade. Galatians 6:1 calls us to restore a brother caught in sin "gently, keeping watch on yourself" — a critical spirit forfeits that role. Judgment can point at what's broken, but it cannot fix it. It can diagnose, but it cannot heal.

So here's what you need to know: there really is a seat of judgment, and there really is a verdict — I've just been trying to sit in the one and hand down the other, when neither was ever mine to hold. The one thing I most want to do for a broken person — heal them — is the one thing my judgment can never do. So who does belong in that seat, and what did He do when He sat there?

The seat of judgment belongs to Jesus. He's the one Judge with every right to condemn — and the first thing He did with that right was lay it down and be condemned in your place. "For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God" (2 Corinthians 5:21). The verdict you kept trying to pronounce over other people had already fallen — on Him, for you. "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" (Romans 8:1).

My role is to love and pray for others, share the gospel, and live like the Jesus who sat with outcasts, washed the disciples' feet, and was judged in my place. Reaching for the gavel is really a kind of pride — an unwillingness to stay in my place as a sinner saved by grace with a glorious message to hand off.

God "gave us the ministry of reconciliation... we are ambassadors for Christ" (2 Corinthians 5:18–20). An ambassador doesn't sentence people. An ambassador carries good news from the King to people who need it.

Jesus warns that the measure we use will be measured back to us (Matthew 7:1–2). Paul says the moment we judge another, we condemn ourselves (Romans 2:1). And all of this means you can finally set the scorecard down — not because sin doesn't matter, but because that's not your job.

You'll still see clearly. But now you see the way a rescued person sees another person who needs rescuing — not from above, but from beside. Everyone you meet, whether they've walked with Christ for forty years or have never heard His name, needs the same gospel you're standing in right now. You don't have anything to hold over anyone. You have good news.

Father, You alone are the Judge, and You are holy and right in all You do. Forgive us for the verdicts we've handed down — the people we've sized up, filed away, and quietly written off. Thank You that Jesus, the one Judge with every right to condemn, sat down in our place and took the sentence we earned. Give us the eyes of the rescued, not the robes of the judge. In Jesus' name we pray —

Remember: The seat of judgment is filled, and it was never yours to sit in.