here comes the judge...

now james deals with an action that pride shows itself in us too often. it is an action that hurts people. it is an action that too many of us are good at doing and the action is judging.

and james hits it head on. james 4.11 & 12 (tev), do not criticize one another, my friends. if you criticize or judge another CHRISTian, you criticize and judge the law. if you judge the law, then you are no longer one who obeys the law, but one who judges it. GOD is the only lawgiver and judge. HE alone can save and destroy. who do you think you are, to judge someone else?

james gets right to the point. when you and i judge, what we are really saying is, "i am GOD."

you see anytime i judge you, anytime you judge me, we're playing GOD. and GOD is the only one who can judge other people. but why do we do it?

well for one we want to excuse our own faults.

romans 2.3 (ms) you didn't think, did you, that just by pointing your finger at others you would distract GOD from seeing all your misdoings and from coming down on you hard?

judging shows how really arrogant we can be sometimes. we think by pointing the finger at somebody else, GOD is going to forget what we've done. or when you point out how somebody else has fallen then you don't look so bad. we use it as an excuse to blame others. we love to accuse others and excuse ourselves.

how do we do that? how do we excuse our sins? we do that by relabeling them…"i'm not a gossip, i'm just sharing a concern," "i'm not lazy, i'm just mellow," "i'm not negative, i'm realistic," "i'm not unreliable, i'm flexible." we have different terminology. we excuse our sins by relabeling them. "i'm not critical, i'm discerning." we all do that.

another reason we judge or criticize is to make us feel superior.

proverbs 26.22 (tev), gossip is so tasty! how we love to swallow it.

we have this natural ability to eat it up because it makes us feel good, it gives us an ego blast. again it strokes our pride.

now there are many different kinds of slander.

there's slander in the first degree – "do you know what that guy's doing?" – a statement of judgment on them.

CHRISTians like slander in the second degree – "i'm sharing this with you so you can pray about it with me." when we hear about how other people have fallen, there's something inside, a little bit of pride … "that just goes to show you.."

the bible teaches that we often tend to judge other people because we think it's going to put us in a better position but whenever you point a finger at somebody, you're pointing three fingers back at yourself. the bible says what we sow, we're going to reap.

i hope you are seeing that judging in no way pleases GOD. in fact, HE hates it because HE hates pride.

just a strong caution from the front porch...