Judged Attractive 5/27/2017
There are many verses in the Bible about judging. We are told not to judge. We are taught about God's judgement. We are told that others will judge us. Judge. Judge. Judge. Lots of judging. Why? There's an easy answer: It's human nature to make judgements and then modify our actions based upon those actions. Here's an easy example: commercials. The entire goal of a commercial is to get you to make a positive judgement of the product and, perhaps, a negative judgement on the competitor's product so that you will go out and buy whatever they're advertising. It's all about judgement. The advertisers know that its your judgement that will influence your action. Did you ever consider this with Scripture. We are told not to harshly judge others because God knows that when we judge other people's sinfulness, we change the way we interact with them. That's one reason Jesus admonishes His followers not to judge #Matthew7. However, not all verses about judging begin with "Judge not". There are other types of verses about judging. They contain phrases like "by this, others will know", "be a testimony", "bear witness to", "show", etc. These verses are not about your own judgement towards others, but others' judgement towards you. The Bible recognizes that others with always be judging us. They will look at our lives, make a judgement, and modify their actions based on their findings. Here's a personal example that stings a bit. When I was in middle school I was really short and really fat. In fact, my family and I refer to those years as the chipmunk days, because I topped off my short-fattiness with a serious buck-tooth. As you may imagine, I was generally picked last at gym class. The team captains took one look at me and decided not to pick me first. Looking back, I don't blame them. I even used to take an inhaler before gym class. On a more serious note, Jesus knew that people would be looking at our lives and judge not only us but also the God that we claimed to know. That's why He said things like this: "By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another." (John 13:35) There are people watching and Jesus asked His disciples to make one thing the general characteristic of His people: a love for others. He said that when people look at Christians this is how they will know that someone is not only a Christian by title but a genuine disciple of God. The author of Hebrews echoes this point in Hebrews 12:1-2, "Therefore, since we also have such a large cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us lay aside every weight and the sin that so easily ensnares us. Let us run with endurance the race that lies before us, keeping our eyes on Jesus, the source and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that lay before Him endured a cross and despised the shame and has sat down at the right hand of God's throne." The author of Hebrews recognized the world of people surrounding us. He calls it a cloud. I looked up how many individual particles (known as cloud condensation nuclei) are collected to make an average cloud. I found out that the minimum number of cloud condensation nuclei in a cloud is 100 nuclei per cubic centimeter. Think of how many cubic centimeters are in even just a small cloud. We're talking about millions upon millions of individual parts in every cloud! The whole world is watching us--judging us, so, according to the author of Hebrews, lets keep our eyes fixed on Christ. So why the Proverb? "The tongue of the wise makes knowledge attractive, but the mouth of fools blurts out foolishness." -Proverbs 15:2. A wise man or woman speaks in a way that makes his or her knowledge attractive. When other people make judgements about what this guy says, they are attracted to his knowledge. The fool, on the other hand, just says whatever, ignorant to the fact that other people are making judgements about what he's saying. According to Jesus, we are to attract other people to the Gospel of Christ. Combined with this Proverb, our speech should attract people to the knowledge of Christ. What we say influences other people's judgement of both us and God. Let's speak in a way that makes God and His truth attractive. Never forget the fact that you are constantly being judged by other people. What you say will cause them to modify their actions or, at the very least, their opinions. Lets cause them to modify their actions towards Christ. After all, is Christ not the most attractive thing that we know. He is the most worthy of our attention. Let's speak in a way that spreads that attraction to other people.
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