On judgment, accountability and confrontation

If I was blatantly blaspheming against Christianity I would expect someone to correct me. Even if I was off on something a small bit or missing a point, or just plain wrong in something that I was doing, I would expect someone to hold me accountable to the standards that Jesus left for us. Furthermore, if I was completely disregarding Jesus in some way I would expect (or demand, for that matter) that someone had the nerve to confront me about it. Unfortunately it seems that Christians avoid confrontation under the guise and excuse that they feel they aren't allowed to judge a person, which leads to an issue.

One of the most pointed to passages about judgment in the Bible comes from Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. Matthew and Luke both record about the same on judgment, quoting Jesus as saying "Do not judge, so that you may not be judged."(NRSV) I have seen people take this verse as meaning that we are never ever allowed to judge anything. That's curious to me, because later in the same sermon Jesus mentions how when we look at our neighbors we're supposed to "take the log out of our own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor's eye." (NRSV, emphasis added.) This seems to imply that we can, under the proper conditions, take specks out of our neighbor's eye. A few paragraphs down, again in the same sermon, Matthew then records Jesus saying we're capable of knowing a false prophet by their fruit. And we're able to know the difference between good fruit and bad fruit. To do so, wouldn't this distinction require some judgment?

Judgment, as an ancient Hebrew word, means something along the lines of governing, determining or concluding. In the OT, we have a book of Judges that governed God's people prior to the establishment of a king. Judgment in this sense seems to be the authority to render decisions. Perhaps when Jesus tells us not to judge, He is simply reminding us that the authority to truly judge an individual is His and not ours. Jesus judges because He is unjudgable—nothing could ever be held against Him.

In my opinion, I feel that there are multiple definitions of judgment here. On the one hand, Jesus seems to imply that we are able to judge by making distinctions between good and evil fruits and effectively the tree that they came from, and on the other hand there seems to be a judgment that we're incapable of making. We do not have the authority or the audacity to claim that we can truly judge another person at the same level Jesus can. So to truly judge people better, and to be able to confront people, we must first examine ourselves from God's perspective, and remove our own faults. Then, it seems, we can see clearer into others. You can be the judge of that.

Regardless, contrast judgment with aspects that Jesus definitively gives us the authority to use: grace and forgiveness. Jesus frequently commands us to forgive others relentlessly. As Christians, we forgive because we have been forgiven (or at least have been offered forgiveness though Christ).

Judgments need to occur within Christian fellowships in order for us to better pursue truth and goodness. When making judgments, we must ensure that we are reminding ourselves that we're not perfect, and will be judged by the same standards we judge others. At the very least, we need to be cautious when making judgments, but we're certainly not incapable of confronting evil. I hope you have a very hopeful summer, and fill it with devotion! God Bless.