The Way To Growth In Christlikeness - Part 10 — Zac Poonen

So in these days, we've been looking at the subject of growing in Christlikeness from Matthew chapter five, chapter six, and chapter seven, because everything written here is really the life of Jesus that he wants to share with us.

Imitating Christ Versus Partaking of His Nature

Remember that we cannot imitate and produce this life. There's a lot of difference between imitating the life of Christ. And that is a danger that we all face and partaking of his nature. Imitating his life would be like getting fruit from the market and beautiful fruit and hanging it on our barren tree.

Whereas partaking of his life is where the fruit comes out from the tree itself. So that's a very subtle danger and we have to be always aware of it. I need to partake of his nature. And if you recognize that, you will always seek to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

Because the standard is so high here in these chapters in the nine right attitudes. And we've seen already eight wrong attitudes. So we wanna now look at Matthew chapter seven and verse one, which is the ninth wrong attitude, which is judging others.

The Danger of Judging Those Who Appear Less Spiritual

Now, whenever a Christian sincerely seeks to live by the standards mentioned in Matthew five, six, and seven, seeking to pursue those nine right attitudes and avoiding all these eight wrong attitudes that we have considered so far, the standard of his life is gonna be so much better than the lives of average Christians around him that there'll be a tremendous temptation in him to judge them.

And that's why the Lord concludes with this wrong attitude finally. Once you have come into this wonderful life I've described in Matthew five and six, be careful that you don't judge others. That's not your calling.

God is the only one who's a judge of others. It's amazing that Jesus said these words in John chapter eight. Let me seek to follow Jesus' example. Listen to his words, John 8, 15. Do you know this verse?

You judge, he was talking to the Pharisees, verse 13, the Pharisees. John 8, 15, you judge according to the flesh. Did he say, I judge according to the spirit? No, he said, I'm not judging anyone. Amazing statement from the one who had every right to judge others whose life was so pure and holy that if he judged and like he says in the next verse, even if I do judge, my judgment will be true.

It'll be accurate because I'm always one with the father in my judgment, but I do not judge anyone. I'm not judging anyone. Now we need to see the command, do not judge others from the life of Jesus. Did he judge the Pharisees?

He exposed the Pharisees very severely and he spoke words of condemnation on them because he was the son of God. And it's right for us to expose false teachers and false prophets and anyone who is seeking to lead Christians astray, deceivers.

So to do not judge does not mean do not discern. It's very important to discern between good and evil. Let me show you this verse in Philippians in chapter one so that we have a balanced understanding of this.

In Philippians chapter one, he's talking about growing in love and love is the greatest virtue. And it says here in Philippians one verse nine, I pray that your love will abound, increase more and more, more and more, still more and more in real knowledge and discernment.

So one of the marks of coming to a higher degree of love is that you discern. And it is only the one whose heart is filled with love who can discern properly. If I'm not pursuing after love, my discernment will be wrong it'll be based on my own assessment and my own understanding, my own preferences and prejudices.

So I have to begin with increasing and abounding in love more and more and then God will give me accurate discernment. And so I'm still not here to judge people but I must discern. I must avoid people who are, particularly if you have a responsibility, you have to discern people.

Judgment Within God-Given Responsibility

So where does this line of judging end? I mean, let's think of, are we never supposed to judge any situation? I believe it depends on whether you have authority in a situation. See Paul says to the Corinthian church in 1 Corinthians 5, when he tells them to put a certain man who's lived in sin out of the church, put him out of the church he says.

And then he says in 1 Corinthians 5 in verse 12, what do I have to do with judging outsiders? I'm not here to judge all those worldly people but don't you judge those who are within the church? Yes, the elders have a right to judge those who are within the church.

Those who are outside God will judge them but God gives the responsibility to elders to judge within the church. And he gives the responsibility to fathers to judge their own children. See if two of your children have a disagreement or a conflict and they come to you, you can't say I won't judge.

If you're a father or a mother, you have to judge there. So judging is in the sphere in which God has given you responsibility. That's important and I should not try to escape that responsibility to judge within that sphere.

And if you're an elder in a church, you have to, you're called to exercise judgment there based on a discernment that has come out of love for your flock. That's very important. For example, if you're working in a office or a factory and you've got responsibility there as the manager or something like that, you have to exercise judgment.

Otherwise you will not be fulfilling your responsibility. So we need to understand what this means. But outside that sphere, I'm not called to judge anybody. Paul was very strict in exercising judgment over the churches he had responsibility for.

He spoke some strong words to people. He called certain people carnal and not spiritual. So let's just keep that in mind as when we think of this word. The other thing I wanna show you is from Isaiah in chapter 11, where we read that Jesus said he would not judge, but we read in Isaiah chapter 11 how he did judge.

And Isaiah chapter 11, we read of the spirit of the Lord verse two, resting upon Jesus. It's a prophetic reference to Christ. The spirit of wisdom, understanding, counsel, strength and knowledge and the fear of the Lord or reverence for the Lord.

The Holy Spirit, it says here, this is the sevenfold spirit mentioned in Revelation. Wisdom, the spirit of the Lord, wisdom, understanding, counsel, strength, knowledge and reverence for the Lord. So one mark of reverence for the Lord, if he delights, it says here in verse three, one of these seven qualifications is highlighted and says the fear of the Lord.

And it says here that Jesus would delight in reverence for the father. And then one of the marks of one who has reverence for God and lives in constant reverence for God is that he will not judge by what his eyes see and he will not make a decision by what his ears hear.

This is so completely foreign and contrary to the race of Adam. I remember years ago, the Lord telling me how, he said, all your life you have judged by what your eyes see and what your ears hear. Now I want to move you out of that realm into another realm, the realm of the spirit where you will not judge by what your eyes see or your ears hear.

You will take in that information. We get a lot of information from our eyes and ears. It's not that we go around blind and deaf. We get information through our eyes and ears, but we don't come to a judgment merely on that information.

That's the point here. Most human beings judge on the basis of what they've seen, they've heard, they say, I know. And I've seen in the church, I would say more than 90 of believers or 99 of believers have this evil habit of judging on the basis of what they've seen and what they've heard.

And if you, my dear brothers and sisters examine yourself, you'll find it is true. Even in your home, you judge by what your eyes see and what your ears hear. And very often it could be completely wrong.

You could be judging your husband and judging your wife on the basis of something you saw and heard. And you may not know all the facts. How often we've all done that. And failure in this area in the past, where we have discovered that we've judged wrongly and even perhaps hurt people sometimes should make us humble ourselves that say, Lord, I never want to judge by what my eyes see or my ears hear.

I want to take in the information. I want to digest it. I want to take it before God. And I want God to give me discernment in this situation as to what I should say or what I should do. So it says here that Jesus would never judge by what his eyes see or his ears hear.

I've often said how the sun rising and setting is one of the means by which God shows us every day. You can't trust your eyes. For many thousands of years, up to about six or 700 years ago, everybody in the world from the time of Adam felt that the sun was going around the earth because that's what their eyes told them.

Till somebody discovered 700 years ago in Europe, some scientists and astronomers that that's not true. Is the earth rotating on its axis? But people could say, I don't see the earth moving. I don't feel the earth moving under my feet.

You can't trust your feeling. You can't trust what you see. You can't even trust what you hear because there are sounds above the frequency of the human ear that we cannot hear, but even dogs hear that.

So all this is to show us, God is trying to humble us saying, you can't trust what your eyes see or your ears hear even in the ordinary things of creation. How much more in spiritual things is good for us to humble ourselves and say very many, many situations, I don't know.

I don't have all the facts. And even when I have all the facts, I don't know the motives. So I will not judge by what my eyes see and what my ears hear. And it says here, but Jesus says in Isaiah 11, for with righteousness, one day he will judge the poor and with fairness.

And if I want to judge with righteousness and fairness, I must begin with love. If I don't love, I cannot judge righteousness and fairness. And see what the scripture tells us, there's a command which I believe the vast majority of Christians do not obey.

Waiting for the Lord's Judgment

1 Corinthians in chapter four. Please ask yourself whether you have obeyed this verse. Please take this seriously, my dear brothers and sisters. If you want to grow in the Christian life, if you are serious about becoming like Christ, take this verse seriously.

If you are serious about spiritual growth, if you're serious about putting your selfish nature to death and your pride to death, here's a verse that can really help you. And I'll tell you, it won't be easy because we've all disobeyed this verse so much in the past.

Listen to it. 1 Corinthians four verse five. Do not go on passing judgment before the time. So that implies there is a time when we'll be permitted to judge, okay? When is that time? It's after we finish our life on this earth.

Wait until the Lord comes. All those who have a tremendous itch to judge others, great lust to judge others. Hang on, God will give you the opportunity to judge. Why can't you wait till the Lord comes?

Because then you'll be able to judge accurately. I'll tell you why, it says here. Because when the Lord comes, there are two things he's gonna bring to light which you can't see right now. See, man looks on the outward appearance and God looks at the heart.

And that's why we can't judge because God sees more than the outward appearance. That's why we can't go by what we see or what we hear. What we see and what we hear is only the outward appearance and the outward sounds and reports and things like that.

But here are two things that we don't see. One is the things hidden in darkness. That means the areas of another person's life which we cannot see. How much is he struggling and battling against a habit which you see?

Maybe he's really trying to get rid of it. And much more than perhaps you're trying to get rid of some of your bad habits. Here he's crying out to God, perhaps in secret, Lord help me. And maybe there's so many good things he does in secret which you don't know.

So we don't know the things hidden in darkness. A truly God-fearing man, for example, will not reveal how much good he does in secret. All you see is he'll try to conceal his good deeds so much that you may think he's doing nothing.

You may think of him as a very selfish person. He may be a very generous person but he doesn't let anybody know about it. And it's so easy to judge by what we think we know when we know so little. What do you know?

Think about the people you know in your own church whom you've known for many years. Tell me how much do you know about their private life? How do you know how they behave at home? How do they speak to their wives and husbands at home?

You don't know. How do you know whether they are doing kind, unselfish acts of goodness to others? How do you know whether they are sacrificing in secret to help many people? All you see is on the outside and you form an opinion by looking at their face or their actions.

It says, don't judge because there are things hidden in the darkness which one day the Lord will reveal when he comes. Every one of us, what we have done in private will one day be revealed like on a screen, a videotape of our memory is gonna play back everything we did from day one of our life.

And then we will see a lot of things that can't be seen on the outside. For example, all the things that are done in secret and that includes the thoughts. Even your wife or husband doesn't know the thoughts you're thinking.

All that will be revealed whether good, it says good or bad, doesn't matter. Everything will be revealed. And that's one thing. The second thing is the motive of men's hearts, why he did it. For example, you see a believer whom you know, whom you respect going into a bar where they are drinking.

And you may think, oh, I didn't realize this guy goes to the bar to drink. He may be going there with tracks to witness to people, which God will reveal in the final day. But it's so easy to judge on the basis of what we see because we have such a tremendous lust to judge.

I believe the lust to get angry and the lust after sex for men and the lust to judge are some of the universal lusts found in all human beings. And we have to put it to death. And even people who are very strict about trying to conquer anger and very strict with dirty sexual thoughts are not so strict with the lust to judge others according to what you see or according to what you've heard.

If you don't believe me, examine your own heart and see what I'm saying is not true. Some of you are very faithful in trying to overcome your anger and also really seeking to battle sexual thoughts and put them all to death.

What about judging others? Are you just as zealous to put that lust to death? There you see, that's why Jesus puts it last in the list so that we think about it. And especially if you have obeyed all the other, kept all the other nine right attitudes and detested all the wrong attitudes, then the great danger is to begin to judge others who you think haven't come as far as you have.

And especially if you're in a church that's preaching holiness and victory over sin and the new covenant, it's so easy to judge others. Don't, it's so easy to judge other churches. Remember this dear brothers and sisters that one day when Christ comes, that word will be fulfilled that many who are first here will be last there.

And many who are last will be first. That even in a church, some of whom you think, you don't think much of, you say, ah, that guy's not so spiritual and he's not, he may be doing a lot of things in secret you know nothing about, which will be revealed in the final day, all the good that he does in secret and all the way he's helped people and he never advertised that to anyone.

And it'll come out in the final day. So things hidden in darkness and the motive with which he did things. And some people you appreciate so much. See today there are a lot of people who appreciate preachers.

I'll tell you honestly, I can never appreciate a preacher who asks for money. I can never appreciate a man who sends letters asking for money to support him because I never see Jesus or the apostles doing it.

No, but we don't know all that. So sometimes we can judge a person wrongly where we know the facts, where a person's openly asking. I mean, I've seen a lot of preachers openly asking for money on television or from their pulpits and wanting more and more and taking advantage of churches.

It's so obvious that you have to discern and you've got to avoid such people. But I'm talking about other situations where you don't know, where you don't know what is the good that he's done in secret.

His attitude towards the commandments, we don't know. So it's always safer not to judge. It says in that day, 1 Corinthians 4, 5, every man's praise will come to him from God. Imagine one day you see one of those brothers whom you had judged so severely on earth and you see God praising him.

How will you feel that day? Lord, I don't want to do it. So I don't want to judge by what my eyes see and what my ears hear. But as an elder in a church, I want to discern. When a person comes to join our church, I want to have discernment.

I ask God for discernment. In fact, it's one of the gifts of the spirit mentioned in 1 Corinthians in chapter 12. 1 Corinthians 12, it says here, God gives different gifts by the Holy Spirit. And one of the gifts mentioned in 1 Corinthians 12, 10 is discerning of spirits.

It's one of the most important gifts for an elder that if you ask God for it, and if God has given you the responsibility as an elder, you know, a person comes to join your church and you should ask God to give you that discernment that you're able to see through him and see things that are not obvious on the outside.

Otherwise you can never be an effective elder. Now, it's very easy for you to imagine that you have it. I'll tell you this. You'll never have it if you don't love. You've got to begin with the verse I showed you in Philippians and chapter one, that your love will grow in discernment.

Remember that verse we looked at at the beginning, Philippians one and verse nine, that your love will grow and abound in discernment. So don't start with discernment first. We've got to love people and then God will give us discernment.

If you don't love them, God's not gonna give you discernment. And it's very important in our day when there's such a lot of false teaching and so many preachers who are after money and honor that we need to expose them, if that's your calling, but we need discernment.

And people coming into the church with wrong motives to get some advantage for themselves, to get some benefit for themselves, to seek their own, we need to ask God to give us discernment. I'm not saying that we should drive them out, but we need to keep them at a distance.

The Bible says in Psalm 138 that God keeps proud people at a distance. I wanna be like God and I wanna keep proud people at a distance. So when a person comes to your church, if you discern the spirit of pride there, keep them at a distance, let them sit at the back row and don't give them any responsibility till they have learned to humble themselves.

The Speck and the Log

Discernment is so important. I mentioned this because there's a lot of difference between discernment and judgment. So it's not that we don't discern. Coming back to Matthew 7, do not judge because in the way you judge, you will be judged one day by your standard of measure, Matthew 7, verse 2, it'll be measured to you.

So this is also gonna be true that when we judge somebody in the final day, God's gonna use that standard to judge us. So be very careful. So if I'm merciful to others, God will be merciful to me. It's much better to be merciful, definitely.

But I'm not saying, disciplining a person as an elder is not to be done. It has to be done. That's not a place for mercy there. There must be grace and truth manifested in the church. It goes on to say here in Matthew 7, in verse 3, why do you look at a speck in your brother's eye, but you don't notice the log that is in your own eye?

So what is this log that is in the eye that prevents us from being able to remove the speck from somebody else's eye? Now, if there's a speck in somebody else's eye, what did Jesus say? Ignore it. You see a defect in a brother in your church or in your family, are you to ignore it and say, no, no, no, I'm not here to judge.

No, if you love him, you'll want to help him. And how do you help him? You've got to first get rid of the log inside your eye. You know, Jesus used some extreme statements. Now, you know, it's impossible to put a huge log inside your eye.

Jesus used strong statements in the Sermon on the Mount, like cutting out their hand and plucking out your eyes and camels trying to go through the eye of a needle. And here's another strong, extreme statement like that, you know, straining at a gnat and swallowing a camel and things like that.

Here's another strong statement like that. Extreme statement, log inside your eye. Jesus is trying to highlight the seriousness of this error. And he says, when you remove the log from your eye, then, verse five, don't ignore the speck.

Remember, the Lord did not say ignore the specks that there are in others. If you have a responsibility as a father or as an elder, you have to try and remove the specks in the eyes of those whom you have responsibility for.

Yeah, we don't have to judge people are outside our sphere of responsibility, but within our sphere of responsibility, we do have a responsibility. We can't just hold back and keep quiet for the sake of popularity.

There are elders like that. They'll never correct anybody because they wanna be popular. They wanna have a reputation for being kind and good and merciful, and they don't care about the church being pure.

They're just concerned about their own reputation for I wanna be known as a gentle, kind, good elder. Well, you're absolutely unfit to be an elder then. In God's church, an elder must have grace and truth.

He must love people so much that he wants to remove the speck from their eyes, but he can't do it if he's just gonna judge by what his eyes see and his ears hear. He must have discernment, which he seeks from the Holy Spirit, and then he must get rid of the log from his eye.

Once he's done that, it says in verse five, then you will see clearly to do what? To take the speck out of your brother's eye. So Jesus did not teach you that you must leave that speck there forever. When you see your speck in your brother's eye, he says, don't just judge him for it.

Get rid of your log, then you can remove it. So the ultimate purpose is to remove that speck from his eye, that defect that he does not see himself perhaps. So we come to what is this log in your own eye?

Very simple, an unloving attitude towards your brother or sister, an unloving attitude towards your husband or your wife. You are unfit to correct your husband or wife if you don't love her or seek to love her or him like Christ loved you.

If you're unwilling to be merciful like Christ was merciful to you, you're totally unfit to remove that speck. You can see numerous faults in your wife, good, but you're unfit to remove them. Maybe there are 10, 15 specks in her eye.

All that you say is true, but you're not the one capable of removing it because you're not seeking to love her like Christ loved the church. You're not even trying. I mean, none of us have reached that height, but you're not even trying.

If it's not based on love, the Lord says, leave it alone. You can't remove it. You're unfit to remove it. You're only judging. The same way if you see specks in your husband's eye. If you really want to remove them, first get rid of the log from your own eye.

But the same with all the brothers and sisters you see in the church. You know, if all of us just took these three, four verses, these five verses in Matthew 7 seriously, it'll make a tremendous difference in your home and in your church.

But I'm sure we have heard these verses numerous times, but we have never taken it seriously. Let me show you another verse in James chapter four. James chapter four, it says in verse 11, don't speak against one another, brothers.

When you speak against a brother or judge your brother, you're speaking against God's law and you're judging God's law. And God's law is love your neighbor as yourself. That's what is the point here. Love your neighbor as yourself.

You know, he speaks about that in chapter two. About that law being there, the speaking against the law of love, the law of liberty mentioned there. So he who speaks against a brother is judging his brother and is judging the law, which says you must love your brother as you love yourself.

And if you judge the law of God, then you're not a doer of the law, you're a judge. There is only one judge, James 4 .12. That's why Jesus said, I judge nobody. Jesus discerned everybody who came to him, but didn't pass judgment on them.

Mercy Triumphing Over Judgment

You remember when the Pharisees brought the woman caught in adultery, they wanted to judge her immediately and stone her to death. They had a verse to quote. You know, people who judge others have always got a verse in the Bible to quote.

They know, they're very sharp in their knowledge of scripture. And they, according to this verse, according to this verse, I got to deal with this. Well, that's exactly how the Pharisees were. And Jesus was a far holier person than all of them.

And he's the one who gave Moses that law from heaven that the woman who commits adultery must be stoned to death along with the one she committed adultery with. The Pharisees never brought the man who committed adultery.

Probably he was a friend of theirs. They left him alone, they just brought the woman. And Jesus, who gave the law from heaven, says, he who is without sin, throw the first stone. They all went away. They had to go away because Jesus was there.

If any of them had thrown a stone, Jesus would have exposed that man's secret sin. They knew that. And they quietly went away beginning with the eldest and nobody was left. And then there was one person left without sin who could throw the stone according to Jesus' own command.

He who was without sin cast the first stone. Who was that? Jesus. He was without sin. He could have thrown the stone according to his own command that he gave Moses on Mount Sinai, but he didn't do it.

Why didn't he obey that command that he gave in the Old Testament law? Because the purpose of that law, you need to understand the spirit. The whole purpose of that law was to show people how serious adultery was, not to get rid of women who slipped up and failed.

God doesn't carry stones in his hand to throw at sinners. None of us will be alive if that's the case. No, he came to save. And so he tells the woman, has no one condemned you? No, Lord, will I do not condemn you.

Does that mean your sin is not serious? No, it is serious. Sister, don't sin again. That's what Jesus said. So you see, there's an example for us of a person who gave a law, but he was merciful and it's mercy triumphs over judgment.

Look at this verse in James chapter two and verse 12. He says that every law in scripture is based on James 2 .8. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. And if you live by that law, you're doing well, he says.

That's where you begin. And then he says, he's talking about partiality here in verse nine. But if you show partiality, then you're committing a sin. That's another thing, let me mention in passing that many elders I've seen are sometimes strict towards others, but very partial when it comes on somebody in their own family.

They always want to defend their wife and their children as if they don't do any wrong. They're very strict on if somebody else's, some other sister or some other child does something wrong or they don't see the same thing wrong in their own children.

I've seen numerous elders in CFC churches who don't see the faults of their own children, but who see faults in other people's, in other people's wives and their children. Well, then you're partial and you're committing a sin.

You're violating the law of love. With God, there is no partiality. All are the same. You gotta hate your father, mother, brother, sister and your wife and children if you wanna be a disciple. Only such a person is strict to be an elder.

It says here, if you want to live according to the law, it says here in verse James 2, verse 12, so speak and so act as those who are to be judged by the law of liberty. The law of love mentioned in verse eight is a law of liberty.

That's the thing that will free us from sin. And then if you don't follow that, it says in verse 13, this is a very important verse, James chapter two, verse 13. Please, my dear brothers and sisters, please listen to this and let it be imprinted in your mind forever.

James 2, 13, God's judgment will be merciless in the final day on those who have not shown any mercy to others. God's judgment will be absolutely merciless to all those people who've not shown mercy to others.

Shall not be merciful to your husband or your wife when they slip up somewhere, make a mistake and you jump down on them and say, how many times I've told you this? Sometimes we can be merciless towards our own children.

It's right to discipline our children, but there must be mercy there as well. And towards other believers, particularly, if you think of some brother in the church whom you don't like, or some brother or sister against whom you have a prejudice for some reason or the other, that's the person towards whom you're likely to be merciless.

You won't be merciless towards someone who's very close to you, whom you like and love and you don't want to offend. But think of your attitude towards some of those folks whom you don't like too much.

Those are the ones towards whom you're likely to be merciless. And if that is the case, God's judgment and then finally, I say this to you in Jesus name. And remember this, don't tell me in the day of judgment, I didn't warn you.

God's judgment will be absolutely merciless to anyone who has judged others without mercy. But it says here, mercy must triumph over judgment in my mind. These are very important verses in relation to what we are studying in Matthew chapter seven, a wrong attitude of judging others.

What does it mean that mercy must triumph over judgment? It doesn't mean I have to ignore the failure. If it's an area where I have responsibility, as I said, I cannot ignore it, but I've got to get rid of this log in my eye, this unloving attitude towards that person, only then am I qualified to help him to remove the speck.

So whenever thoughts of judgment come up in my mind, I must allow mercy also to come up and decide here what to do. Mercy in my mind must triumph over judgment. It does not mean ignoring the fault. It does not mean that if you're a person over whom you have responsibility, does something wrong, you forget about it.

That's not the meaning of mercy. God is the most merciful person in the universe, but how strict he is in punishing sin. He sends people to hell forever. Who sends people to hell forever? The most merciful person in the whole universe.

So it's not saying that there is no place for discipline, but mercy must always triumph over judgment. So those are a few thoughts concerning this passage on judgment in Matthew chapter seven. And as I said, it's those of us who are really serious about the commands in Matthew chapter five and six, who are overcoming anger and overcoming bitterness and overcoming seeking honor and all that, and have come to a good life in Christ and into the new covenant life.

We are the ones who are most in danger of judging others who have not come to this new covenant life. You know, Jesus spoke about the Pharisee. Lord, I thank you. I'm not like that man there. We can have that attitude too.

Lord, I thank you that I'm not like that visitor who's coming to our church. He doesn't seem to have any light. Lord, I thank you. I'm not like those people in those other churches. I thank you, Lord, that we are preaching better things than those other preachers.