A Sermon on Not Judging
Trinity 4 Midweek , St. Luke 6:36-42
July 16, 2025 A+D
In the Name of the Father and of the +Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
The world gives away its vices when it fusses over judginess in the church. Self-righteous, mis-judging makes small men feel big. They, and we, in our fallen flesh, vainly imagine that we sit above it all, objective, fair, and wise. We are the critiques par excellence. All men should seek our approval.
According to Jesus if you call a man a fool, even that man can’t hear you, even if he is only an image on a screen, then you are in danger of Hellfire. Don’t brush off the sayings of Jesus. That is what He says. He means it. Yet you have called men fools and worse. You are in danger of Hellfire. Repent.
This sort of judging is unbefitting of our calling. It is condemned by the 8th commandment. Even if the judgments were accurate or fair, even if your brother-in-law or your co-worker is a fool, the commandment damns you. Your sins hurt people. They damage your faith.
The golden rule is still the best rule. We hate to be judged with the judgment with which we have judged by our schoolmates. Who has never been bullied into silence or towing the party line simply for fear of judgment? In our current context a single misstep, the repetition of a thoughtless cliche, or even failure to praise and pander to the right group with the right words and enthusiasm can end a career or incite violence. And if that can happen when the one being judged is actually innocent, imagine what happens when we actually deserve judgment, that is when we say something wrong or ignorant or mean out of stress or pain. You could be the next “Karen” that the world feels superior to. You could lose your job and your family and friends because of it.
We would be fools to not be careful, but even so we are weak. We sometimes lash out in that weakness, from pain or fear or exhaustion. We sometimes cave in to our baser desires. We hide in corners of the internet and imagine ourselves anonymous. And if that weren’t enough of a problem, the world’s standards are ever changing. We cannot appease them. the prince of this world is the father of lies. He loves this misjudging, the plotting, the putting on of appearances. If we think that we must win his approval through the world’s judgment we will be driven either to self-righteous delusion or to despair.
Let us turn instead to Christ, the author and perfecter of our faith. He is more ready and eager to forgive than Joseph whose own brothers sold him into slavery after seriously considering simply murdering him. The Holy Trinity has plans for us beyond this groaning world. He has adopted us into His family and home. He has redeemed our bodies and souls. He has done this by making Himself the victim of slander, false accusations, and racism. He has suffered terrible injustices and cruelties. He has been tortured and betrayed and killed. All this He has borne in our place. His sorrow is our bride price. He has won and paid for us with His own life. We are free not only of the punishment that our sins deserve but free of His judgment of guilt and judged instead to be righteous. And if that is so, and it is, then what do the world’s empty words matter or what can they do to us? Kill the body only? We do not fear that for we have Christ. For Christ’s sake we are spared our Father’s wrath. The judgment of the world is moot. He presents us as His immaculate Bride, clean and without blemish, free of the past, of guilt and regret, with eyes only for Him.
That is both a present and a future reality. Our guilt is removed now and we are declared righteous. And yet, we do not yet fully know this righteousness in our bodies or our minds. We must contend still with our own fallen flesh and the broken world all around us. This is not our home. We have failed here more times than we can count. We have failed to live up to God’s Law. So also bad things have been done to us, some of which we deserved and should expect, but much which we shouldn’t and which defy the mercy that is ours by Divine right. What is the end of this? That we are ever more eager to depart from this world. For us to die is gain.
While we are here, groaning with creation in eager expectation of our revelation to the world as the church, and ourselves as God’s own sons, we fight within ourselves. The old man is daily drowned by the Law. We hear Jesus’ command: “Do not judge” and we know that we have. We repent. We recommit. We ask for grace and help to set our wills against sin. We want to cooperate with the Holy Spirit in what is good, in what He gives, in what He says, even if and when what He says is against us. And we trust that our salvation is secure in Him, by His grace, not by our keeping of the Law, but by His keeping of the Law and facing judgment for us. We are saved by grace through faith. This is not a pious wish or fantasy. This is solid rock, deepest fact, unchangeable truth: Jesus died and lives for us and our sins are forgiven in Him.
When it comes to our own temptation to judge in the ways of the world and our failures to resist it, our repentance and amending of our lives means that we must do the work of reconciliation. While the world has a vociferous group of spectators ever ready to judge and criticize all actions by their own fickle standards, our homes and our families and our church do not. We must not. We can not. We are not spectators. We are not waiting to sweep in on those who make a mistake or who cave in to lust or anger or greed. We are brothers and sisters in Christ. We are bound by forgiveness and compassion. We kneel together in humility and joy. We pray therefore for courage and compassion, that we would act as true friends and companions. We ask that the Spirit would increase our love for one another and give us wisdom so that we would actually care for one another in word and deed and thought. We are not interested in party slogans or pretend orthodoxy. We do not care for code language meant to show that we are in the right tribe or on the right side. We love one another. We always have - even we have acted as though we did not - because we belong to Christ and love Him and we love what He loves and He loves us, everyone of us. .
Forgiveness and tolerance are some novelty or response to our currently extra judgy environment. They are the hallmark of Christianity from the moment that God walked in the garden seeking Adam not in wrath but in mercy. This is what God has done for us, how He sustains us, and who He makes us to be. Our prayer is that God honor us by allowing us to care for one another where it hurts and where we differ. We do not ignore the specks in one another’s eyes, nor do we seek to profit from them or to show our superiority in any way. Let there be no schadenfreude among us, no delight in the failure of our enemies or our friends, nor any envy and pain at others happiness.
Let us continue, by grace, in what God has begun, in what we learned in the Catechism. We strive to speak and act and even think in love at all times and places, to put the best construction on why specks exist, and to see one another as Christ sees us, in compassion and mercy, and not as competition.
This the measure that Christ has used with us even though we have no right to it. In Him, we ask, that we might share it also with one another and be His Church.
In +Jesus’ Name. Amen.