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Judge
not according to the appearance, but judge
righteous judgment
john 7 verse 24
There is always a lot of talking about
"judging". As soon as you want to
expose a false teacher, calling him by name
and explaining as to why the teachings is
false, you will always find one or two or
more people who want to defend their
post-modern stance of INTOLERANT
"TOLERANCE" by "quoting"
"jesus" and they say: "Judge
Not".
However, as we see in the quote above,
that is only a very little part of the
complete message. The complete message is
not to judge a judgment according to
appearance, but to judge a righteous judgment.
Yesus never told His disciples not to
judge. Disciples of Yesus are ordered to
check out if these things are so, when
people come in His Name to teach all kinds
of things. Paulus says that he judges, Yesus
tells us to judge righteous.
So, what is a judgment according to
appearance? Lately, I have been judged
according to my appearance. And the funny
part of it was, that I was judged according
to my appearance because I judged a
righteous judgment.
It was during the exposé of a false
teacher, a self-proclaimed "spiritual
leader" who had a terrible hermeneutics
(bible explanation) and outright false
teachings. Someone told me that because of
the appearance of this false teacher, an
appearance this person had judged as similar
as that of my person, I should not judge.
It's odd. People who sincerely claim how
a Christian should not judge, fortunately do
not practice what they preach.
For we HAVE to judge.
We have to judge whether the teachings of
self-proclaimed spiritual leaders, christian
leaders, are in accordance with the Bible.
We have to judge those that are
"inside", Peter says. (Note: It
was Paul, not Peter, as an attentive reader remarked)
No, not according to appearance. For
everyone can have a certain skin color and
dreads or not. You do not see it on the
outside. You can see a man's face but you
can't see his heart, I heard someone sing
one time.
So what do we have to judge?
The teachings and claims that someone
makes, especially when they are given in the
Name of Yesus Kristos. Especially when
someone comes and "preaches the
gospel", then we have to see whether
these things are really so, as the biblical
phrase goes.
The bible commends the people from Berea,
who searched the Scriptures daily to see
whether the things Paulus told them were so.
A good Christian teacher will motivate,
support and call on "his" audience
to check and double check and this good
Christian Teacher will be happy with every
critique when it's solid.
For we are to be happy with the truth.
And when we claim to be Christian Teachers,
when we bring things in His name, we must be
willing to be checked and we must be willing
to stand corrected.
And we can only be corrected when our
brotherman has judged a righteous judgment.
As far as I'm concerned, people can not
come to me and tell me "judge
not". For they, when they say a thing
to me like that, have already judged
themselves. They have judged that they have
to tell me not to judge. And this should
make it obvious and clear how an
unconditional "judge not" will
never be on the "menu" of the
Disciple of Yesus Kristos.
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