Free from Judgment, and Free from Judging

Recently, my thinking has been challenged on Matt 7:1-2 "Judge not, that you be not judged. 2 For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you.

I have always understood this to mean that if I judge other people, then God will judge me. The verse does not actually say that. It just says I will be judged. The next verses deal with human relationship; don’t try to take a speck out of your brothers eye, don’t give dogs what is holy. Maybe this verse means that if I judge other people, then other people are going to judge me.

Luke 6:37-38 "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."

This also may be dealing with human relationships. In dealing with people, if I judge and condemn, then other people are going to judge me and if I forgive, then other people also will forgive me; and the way I treat others will come back to me pressed down and running over. When I am harsh and critical with someone, they usually return even more harsh and critical. If my treatment of other people is gentle and merciful, that is what I will get in return.

Judging may be negative, but not always, mostly, to judge is to decide what is the inner motivation of a person, to think I understand why a person does the things that he does. It is not judgmental to have a thought like, “That person is really dirty.” That may be an observation with no values placed on it. We can’t help but observe the things that are around us. The judgment comes when I think, “He should have put on clean clothes before going out” or even, “I bet he works really hard for a living.” I don’t know why he is dirty and I don’t need to have an opinion about the fact. Then, there may be the temptation to think, “He just does not care what he looks like in public”, which would be to judge the persons heart or mind based on what I observed. I really can’t know what is going on inside a person.

I have really worked hard to stop making any kind of judgment on people, and I will say it  is really freeing. I am training myself to just observe the facts and recognize when I cross over into making judgments by placing a value on what I see.