Luke 6:37-42--Judging Others

Luke 6:37-42
English Standard Version

Judging Others
37 “Judge not, and you will not be judged; condemn not, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you will be forgiven; 38 give, and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use it will be measured back to you.”

​39 He also told them a parable: “Can a blind man lead a blind man? Will they not both fall into a pit? 40 A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone when he is fully trained will be like his teacher. 41 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? 42 How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me take out the speck that is in your eye,’ when you yourself do not see 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 out the speck that is in your brother's eye.

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Again, it's helpful to compare these verses to their counterparts in Matthew 5, 6, and 7 (these verses are most closely associate with the beginning of Matthew 7).  These verses have often been taken out of context to say that Jesus preached the "Prosperity Gospel" or that we are never to call anything right or wrong (we are not to "judge" at all by whatever the world calls "judging" at that moment).  Jesus did not mean that we are not to call sin what it is.  That's clear if we keep reading Matthew 7.  We are told to judge rightly and to only use God's Word to judge as that is the same measure that we will be judged by.

These verses though go to the issue of treating others the way that we want to be treated.  That was the last verse before this one in Luke.  If we go around pointing out everyone else's mistakes we should not expect grace when we make a mistake, but if we have grace and mercy with others and forgive them as we have been forgiven, then we would expect that to be repaid with them having grace and mercy and forgiving us.  That's not always the case as we can't expect the world to emulate the forgiveness that comes from God, but we should definitely expect that we will not have forgiveness extended to us if we don't extend it to others.

Jesus said to expect what you "measure out" to come back to you in even greater measure.  This is a general principle, like we see in the Proverbs, but not necessarily a hard and fast "law" that always applies in every circumstance.  Jesus not saying that we "sow a dollar" we will "reap 100 dollars."  No, Jesus is saying that those who are merciful will receive mercy (we already saw that in the Beatitudes both in Matthew and Luke).

Next, Jesus tells them that the goal of discipleship is to become like the Teacher (that is to become like Jesus).  The disciples is not greater than the Master/Teacher and needs to learn every lesson that the Teacher is trying to teach him.

Jesus then moves onto the lesson about the hypocrisy of trying to take a speck out of someone's eye when you have a log in your own eye.  Jesus doesn't say that we shouldn't try to help our brother take the speck out of his eye if we see it, but we need to first take the log out of our own eye so that we can see clearly to help our brother take the speck out of his eye.  So it is with biblical judgment.  We must not come into a situation to declare that someone needs to repent of an issue when we are openly living in sin and being disobedient ourselves.  Part of church discipline is for us to first examine ourselves and then to always address the the issue by the Word of God so that it's not just my opinion on the issue.  If the person you are trying to correct brings up something in your life that you have overlooked but seems obvious to everyone else, then humbly take care of that issue before the LORD right there and then and model the kind of repentance that you want the person you are talking to to show.  We should not try to hold ourselves to a different standard than we hold others to--in fact, we should hold ourselves to a higher standard when we are going around trying to help our brother see the speck in his eye.