Welcome to Day 2111 of  Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

Sermon on the Mount 9 – A Christian’s Relationships: Judging Others and Effective Prayer – Daily Wisdom

Putnam Church Message – 07/11/2021

Sermon on the Mount – A Christian’s Relationships: Judging Others and Effective Prayer

Matthew 7:1-12 "Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.  Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces.  Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!  So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets." Matthew 7 consists of several self-contained paragraphs. Their link with each other is not apparent. Nor does the chapter as a whole follow on from the previous chapter with any precise sequence of thought. However, the connecting thread which runs through chapter 7, however loosely, is that of relationships. It would seem quite logical that having described a Christian’s character, influence, righteousness, holiness, and ambition, Jesus should concentrate finally on our relationships. The Christian counter-culture is not individualistic but a community event. Relations within the community between the citizens of God’s kingdom and those who are not yet citizens are of overriding importance. Matthew 7 deals with the network of 7 relationships into which we are drawn as the followers of Jesus. We will focus on the first four this week, and the remainder over the next week or two. The seven relationships include:

1. To our fellow citizens of God’s Kingdom (1–5).
2. To a group startlingly designated ‘dogs’ and ‘pigs.’ (6)
3. To our heavenly Father (7–11).
4. To everybody in general: the Golden Rule (12).
5. To our fellow citizens of God’s kingdom (13, 14).
6. To false prophets (15–20).
7. To Jesus our Lord (21–27).

1. Our attitude to our fellow citizens of God’s kingdom (verse 1–5)

Jesus does not anticipate that the Christian community will be perfect.

1. The Christian is not to be a judge (verses 1-2)

Jesus’ words, “Do not judge others, and you will not be judged,” are well-known but often misunderstood.  Judgment within a court of law is not the focus here. In our personal lives, our Lord’s injunction, “Do not judge others,” cannot be understood as a refusal to discern between truth and error, goodness and evil. How can we be sure that Jesus was not referring to these things? Partly because it would not be honest but hypocritical to behave like this. This and other passages tell us about God’s love of integrity and hatred of hypocrisy. Humans are created to be imagers of God, including the ability to make value judgments. Christ’s teaching in the Sermon on the Mount is based on the assumption that we will (indeed should) use critical thinking to determine how to live right. We are to develop righteousness that exceeds that of the Scribes and Pharisees. Our right living should exceed the world's standard of love we adopt. We are not to be like the hypocrites in our right living or the heathen in our ambition. How can we possibly obey all this teaching unless we first evaluate the performance of others and then ensure that ours is different from and higher than theirs? If, then, Jesus was neither abolishing law courts nor forbidding critical thinking, what did he mean by “Judge not”?  The follower of Jesus can use their powers of discernment, but they are not a “judge” in the sense of being overcritical. Blindly judging others is a compound sin consisting of several unpleasant ingredients. The appeal in this passage is not to be a fault-finder who is negative and destructive towards other people and enjoys actively seeking out their failings. We are not to be someone who gleefully hunts out faults in others while completely ignoring our faults. Worse than that, to be a fault-finder is to set oneself up as superior or judge and claim the competence and authority to sit in judgment of other Christ-followers. In doing so, you usurp the prerogative of the divine Judge, and you are taking on a role reserved for God. Not only are we not the judge, but we are among the judged, and shall be judged with greater strictness ourselves if we dare to judge others. We are to be critical thinkers without being overly critical. The plea to be generous when dealing with others.

1. The Christian is not to be a hypocrite (verses 3-4)

Jesus now tells his famous little parable about “foreign bodies” in people’s eyes, specks of sawdust on the one hand and logs or planks on the other. So here is another reason we are unfit to be judges: not only because we are fallible humans (and not God), but also because we are fallen humans. The fall has made all of us sinners. So we are in no position to stand in judgment on our fellow sinners; we are disqualified from the bench. The picture of somebody struggling with the delicate operation of removing a speck of dirt from a friend’s eye, while a vast plank in his eye entirely obscures his vision, is ludicrous in the extreme.

1. The Christian is instead to be a friend (verses 5)

Our Christian duty is not to see the speck in our friend’s eye while, at the same time, we do not notice the log in our own. The standard of Jesus for relationships in the Christian counter-culture is high and healthy. In our attitudes and behavior towards others, we play neither the judge (becoming harsh, judgmental, and condemning) nor the hypocrite (blaming others while excusing ourselves). Instead, we are to be a friend, caring for others so much that we first blame and correct ourselves and then seek to be constructive in the help we give them.

1. Our attitude to “dogs” and “pigs” (verse 6)

At first sight and hearing, this is startling language from the lips of Jesus, especially in the Sermon on the Mount, and immediately after his appeal for constructive behavior with friends. Nevertheless, the context provides a healthy balance. If we are not to “judge” others, finding fault with them in a judgmental, condemning, or hypocritical way, we cannot ignore their faults and pretend that everybody is the same. Both extremes are to be avoided. The saints are not judges, but “saints are not simpletons” either. If we first remove the log from our eye and thus see clearly to take a speck from our friend’s eye, they will appreciate our kindness. But not everyone is grateful for criticism and correction. According to the book of Proverbs, this is one of the apparent distinctions between a wise person and a fool. Proverbs 9:8 So don’t bother correcting mockers; they will only hate you. But correct the wise, and they will love you. Who, then, are these “dogs” and “pigs”? By giving them these names, Jesus is indicating that they are more animals than humans and that they are animals with dirty habits. The dogs he had in mind were not the well-behaved lapdogs of an elegant home but the wild pariah dogs, vagabonds, and mongrels, which scavenged in the city’s rubbish dumps. And pigs were unclean animals to the Jews, not to mention their love for mud. So the NLT clarifies it a bit… “Don’t waste what is holy on people who are unholy. Don’t throw your pearls to pigs! They will trample the pearls, then turn and attack you.”  So then the “dogs” and “pigs” with whom we are forbidden to share the gospel pearl are not just unbelievers. They must instead be those who have had ample opportunity to hear and receive the good news, but have decisively—even defiantly—rejected it.  They have made their choice. Of course, there is always hope that those who have rejected God will turn to Him. Our teaching here is we are to focus our energies on those who are receptive to the teachings of Christ. This teaching of Jesus is for exceptional situations only; our standard Christian duty is to be patient and persevere with others, as God has patiently persevered with us. 

1. Our attitude to our heavenly Father (verses 7–11)

It seems natural that Jesus should move on from our relationship with our fellow Christ-followers to our relationship with our heavenly Father and His divine grace with us.

1. The promises Jesus makes

This passage is not the first instruction on prayer in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus has warned us against pharisaic hypocrisy and pagan formalism, and has given us his model prayer. Now, however, he actively encourages us to pray by giving us some very gracious promises. Jesus seeks to imprint his promises on our minds and memory through the hammer blows of repetition. First, his promises are attached to direct commands. The NLT shares the heart of verse 7, “Keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you.” Secondly, the promises are expressed in universal statements in verse 8, “For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.” Thirdly, Jesus illustrates his promises with a simple and easy-to-understand parable in verses 9–11, “You parents—if your children ask for a loaf of bread, do you give them a stone instead? Or if they ask for a fish, do you give them a snake? Of course not!  So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him.” So the force of the parable lies in contrast rather than in a comparison between God and parents. But, nevertheless, there is no doubt that our prayers are transformed when we remember that the God we are coming to is “Abba, Father,” and infinitely good and kind. If we belong to Christ, God is our Father, we are his children, and prayer is coming to him with our requests. The trouble is that it seems too simple, even simplistic, for many of us. In our sophistication, we say we cannot believe it; in any case, it does not altogether agree with our experience. So we turn from Christ’s prayer promises to our prayer problems.

1. The problems humans raise

Confronted by the straightforward promises of Jesus, keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. We then raise several objections which we need now to consider.

1. Prayer is unseemly. Jesus said earlier that our heavenly Father knows what we need and cares for us anyway. Besides, he indeed cannot be bothered with our petty affairs. The question is not whether he is ready to give, but whether we are prepared to receive. So in prayer, we do not coerce God, but rather learn to submit to God.

1. Prayer is unnecessary. This second objection arises more from experience than from theology. Thoughtful Christians look around them and see many people getting on fine without prayer. Indeed they seem to receive without prayer the very same things that we receive with it. They get what they need by working for it, not praying for it. We may be tempted to say, “This proves that prayer doesn’t make an ounce of difference; it’s so much wasted breath.”

God gives to all life and breath. He sends rain from heaven and fruitful seasons to all. He makes his sun rise on the evil and the good alike. None of these gifts depends on whether people acknowledge their Creator or pray to him. But God’s gift of redemption is different. God does not grant salvation to all alike but to all who call on him. Romans 10:13 “For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” The same applies to post-salvation blessings, the “good things” that Jesus says the Father gives his children. It is not material blessings that he is referring to here, but spiritual blessings. These blessings include daily forgiveness, deliverance from evil, peace, increased faith, hope, and love. Most important is the indwelling work of the Holy Spirit as the comprehensive blessing of God. John 15:26 “But I will send you the Advocate—the Spirit of truth. He will come to you from the Father and will testify all about me.”

1. Prayer is unproductive. I prayed to be healed of an illness, and it got worse. I prayed for peace, but the world is filled with the noise of war. So prayer doesn’t work! This is the familiar problem of unanswered prayer.

Perhaps we could put the matter this way: being good, our heavenly Father gives only good gifts to his children; being wise also, he knows which gifts are good and which are not. So then, if we ask for good things, he grants them; if we ask for things that are not good for us, he denies them, and only he knows the difference.

1. The lessons we learn

Before we ask, we must know what to ask for and whether it accords with God’s will; we must believe God can grant it and genuinely want to receive it. Then the gracious promises of Jesus will come true.

1. Our attitude to all – The Golden Rule (verse 12)

We see that verse twelve is the best-known example of the supposed parallelism between the Jewish Talmud (Law) and the Sermon on the Mount. Verse 12 “Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you. This is the essence of all that is taught in the law and the prophets.” Compare verse 12 to Galatians 5:14, “For the whole law can be summed up in this one command: Love your neighbor as yourself.” This command is a high standard because self-love is a powerful force in our lives. In nearly every situation, self-advantage often guides us in our affairs; now, we must also let it guide us in our behavior toward others. All we have to do is use our imagination, put ourselves in the other person’s shoes, and ask, ‘How would I like to be treated in that situation?’ I mentioned at the beginning that the Christian counter-culture is not just an individual value system and lifestyle, but a community affair. It involves relationships. And the Christian community is, in essence, God’s family. So in Matthew 7:1–12, Jesus has introduced us to these fundamental relationships. At their center is our heavenly Father, God to whom we come, who we depend, and who never gives his children other than good gifts. Next, there are our fellow believers.  If our fellow Christians are indeed citizens of God’s kingdom, it is inconceivable that we shall be anything other than caring and constructive in our attitude toward them. As we wrap up for today, let me leave you with this thought: Let us put ourselves sensitively into the other person’s place and desire for them what we would choose for ourselves. If we can do that, we will never be mean, always generous, never harsh, always understanding, never cruel, and always kind. Thank you so much for allowing me to be your guide, mentor, and, most importantly, your friend as I serve you through this Wisdom-Trek podcast and journal. As we take this trek together, let us always:

1. Live Abundantly (Fully)
2. Love Unconditionally
3. Listen Intentionally
4. Learn Continuously
5. Lend to others Generously
6. Lead with Integrity
7. Leave a Living Legacy Each Day

I am Guthrie Chamberlain reminding you to Keep Moving Forward, Enjoy Your Journey, and Create a Great Day Everyday! See you next time for more wisdom from God’s Word!