Proverbs 12:1, “Whoever loves
discipline loves knowledge, but whoever hates correction is stupid.” Yep, many
versions of the Bible use the word “stupid.” KJV uses “brutish” from which the
word stupid comes from.
To paraphrase – If you love
learning, you love discipline that goes with it.
Let’s admit we Christians have
habits of saying certain things out loud or in our heads. I believe these words
and phrases act like roadblocks to our growth, transformation and maturity in
Christ. After all, the goal of a Christian is to be transformed into the
likeness of Christ through His Holy Word. To be different people than we are
now - tomorrow. We want sin to be a lesser part of our lives than it was
yesterday. We want to love God more tomorrow than we do today right? So, during
our journey and transformation there are roadblocks we set up that we need to
take down. One of these roadblocks is – We have to stop using bible words in
the wrong way. One particular phrase we often hear used is “Don’t judge me.”
The poster could read in today’s
culture even among Christians – “If you want to be happy, get rid of all the
negativity in your life” Matthew 7:1 right? Who wants negativity in their life?
I will tell you who - People who want to grow… Did you get that? But even
Christians forget or don’t understand this verse. Jesus is teaching not to over
judge by our standards, and not to judge their fellow Jews by tradition and the
law as the Pharisee’s did out of hypocrisy. They judged with wrong judgments.
What Jesus says in John 7:24, “Don’t
judge by appearances, but judge with right judgement.” In other words, there is
a time to judge and a time not to judge. There is a way to judge and a way not
to judge. But this post isn’t about the theological understanding of judging,
it’s about the judging by someone of me or you. Its personal.
As the Proverb says, whoever
ignores instruction despises himself. - If our goal is maturity, growth, intelligence
and spirituality, then we must listen to correction and criticism. Do we have
an attitude of seeking correction and criticism? Why would we do that? Because
we love knowledge and pursuing God! The question is, by who do we seek
knowledge and spiritual criticism? Someone who has lived life and is wise among
the brethren who has the stripes of life to be able to constructively help
counsel us in the way of the Lord.`
The people of Jesus day judged
Him for all kinds of things didn’t they? Jesus response was not – “Don’t judge
Me.” His response was “Judge with righteous judgement” John 7:24
If a brother or sister in Christ
rightly judges us, we put up a roadblock to keep out all the negativity in our
lives, and we will keep it out. But, we will keep ourselves from growing, we
will limit ourselves from being transformed in His image. The question is, “Is
this judgement I am receiving right?” Not do I like them or not or its mom and
dad, I have heard a lifetime of advice from them. Do I like the tone of voice
they took rightly judging me? I’m just going to discount their righteous
advice, I’m my own person now. Those aren’t the questions we ought to ask. The
questions we need to ask are, “Is their judgement right, is it biblical, is it
sound, healthy and wise? If so then listen to them and grow driving through
this Don’t Judge Me roadblock ridding it from our vocabulary.
James 1:19-20, “Everyone
should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, because
human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires.”
Amen.
