Spiritual judgment and discrimination (3) A Doctrine That Leads To Grace

The general deductions and the implications of this verse (Matt.7:6) are of grave importance because there is not a single statement in the Scripture that gives the devastating effect of sin upon man as this verse. The effect of sin and evil upon the souls of men as the result of the fall is to make man, with respect to the truth of God, dogs and swine. This gives to man antagonism to truth. “The carnal mind” says Paul “is enmity against God” (Rom. 8:7) – the nature of the dog and the swine. Sin makes man hate God and, also “hateful (or full of hate), and hating one another” yes, God-haters are not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. (See Titus 3:3). Present the word of God – the Gospel – to such people and they snarl at it. Talk about the blood of Christ, and they laugh and make jokes about it, and even spit upon it. This is what sin does to man; this is what it does to its nature; this is how it affects his attitude towards the truth. It is something that gets into the very depths and vitals of man’s being, and turns him into something that is not only hateful, but utterly opposed to God, and purity, cleanliness and holiness and truth.
The emphasis placed on this is because we often do not realize the true condition of the souls, minds and spirits of people when they fail to respond immediately to our message of salvation or Gospel truth. We tend to get impatient with them because we fail to see and realize the extent they have come under the dominion of Satan and sin; that they have been ensnared by the devil and consequently have become so much the dupes, twisted and, perverted and polluted – that is the word – inwardly by sin, that they are really in a spiritual sense, in the condition of the dog and the swine. They do not and cannot appreciate that which is holy; they do not attach any value to spiritual pearls. If we do not start by understanding and realizing this condition of theirs, we shall never be able to help them. And as we realize the truth about such people, we begin to understand why our Lord had compassion on people, with great sorrow in His heart as He looked upon them in pity. We shall never be able to help anybody until we have the same spirit and mind in us, and realize that in a sense they are helpless to themselves. They need a new nature – they must be born again. This statement (of Matt. 7:6) is a doctrine that leads directly to grace; nothing but the rebirth can ever enable any man to appreciate and receive the truth. Dead in trespasses and sins, we must be saved by the Holy Spirit before we can ever give a true response to divine instruction. You may now see and appreciate the number of doctrines hidden away in this statement by our Lord Jesus Christ.
Now let us turn to the nature of the truth. Truth is very varied, truth is very full. It is not all exactly the same; there are different varieties – such as milk and strong meat. There is truth in the Scripture which is appropriate to the very beginner but as the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews says “Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God” (Heb. 6:1). He seems to be saying that ‘we need not to go back again to lay a foundation of first principles of true Christianity; we ought to have finished with that. If only you will exercise yourself, I can take you on to this great Melchisedec doctrine, but I cannot do it now because you are slow to hear and understand’ This indicates clearly that there is great composite character to the truth – the word of God or Gospel.
The question we must always ask ourselves is am I growing in my knowledge? Am I hungering and thirsting after this higher doctrine – this is the wisdom that Paul has for them that are perfect? Do I feel that I am proceeding, as it were, from the Epistle to the Galatians to the Epistle to the Ephicians?
Am I on, to these great profound truths. These questions can only be correctly answered by true children of God!
There are certain secrets in the Bible which only God’s children can appreciate. Read the introduction to the Epistle to the Ephesians, just the first five, nine or ten verses, and there you will find the doctrine that only the children of God can understand and appreciate; indeed only those children of God who are exercising their spiritual senses and growing in grace can benefit from it. People in spiritual ignorance may argue about the doctrine of God’s calling and election, and questions like that, without having any understanding about them. But if one is growing in grace, these doctrines will become more and more precious to the one. They are secrets which are only given to those who can receive them. If you find that some of these great and mighty expositions of the truth which are in the Epistles say nothing to you; examine yourself and ask yourself why you are not growing, and why you cannot assimilate these truths. There is a great distinction to be drawn between first principles and the more advanced principles. There are people who spend their lifetime in the realm of apologetics and who never go on to the deeper spiritual truths. They remain the babies of the Christian life. “Let us go on unto perfection” and try to develop an appetite for these deeper aspects of the Truth.
As stated at the inception of this discourse, the statement under exegetic consideration here is the conclusion of our Lord’s teachings on Christian life, particularly concerning the difficult and involved subject of retribution. Proceeding this is the statement “Judge not …” etc. This calls for a brief discuss on what the Lord Jesus meant by ((judge not”. This is necessary to give firm stand to the statement: “Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cost ye your pearls before the swine, lest they trample them under their feet and turn again and rend you”.
So what does our Lord Jesus Christ mean when He said “judge not…” (Matt. 7:1). To look up the word “judge” in the dictionary cannot offer any satisfactory definition in the context of our Lord’s teaching here, for it has different interpretations to different people, because we are today living in an age in which definitions are at a discount, an age which dislikes thought and hates theology, doctrine and dogma. It is an age characterized by love of ease and compromise – “anything for a quiet life”. It is an age that dislikes strong men, because, it holds that such always cause disturbance. It dislikes a man who knows what he believers. It dismisses such man as a difficult person who is “impossible to get on with”
With this type of attitude, the statement “judge not …” is widely but wrongly interpreted to mean that it must be taken simply and literally as it is, and to mean that a true Christian should never express an opinion about others, no judging whatsoever and that the Christian must be easy, indulgent and tolerant, allow almost everything for peace, quiet and unity. However, I emphatically hold that this cannot, and, is not what the Lord Jesus Christ taught in this passage, because of what the Scriptures say in other passages… take the very context of the statement itself, and you surely see at once that such an interpretation of the Lord’s “judge not” is quite impossible. Take verse 6 of Matt. 7, for instance: “Give not that which is holy unto the dogs… etc”, you will immediately be confronted with the question: how can this be put into practice if one does not exercise judgment? How can one know which kind of person is dog-like – with this type of interpretation of the Lord’s “judge not”. In other words, the injunction that immediately follows this statement, about judging, at once calls upon one to exercise judgment and discrimination. The same consideration and conclusion go for verse 15: “Beware of false prophets which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly, they are raving wolves”
These simply mean that it is wrong to hold on to the letters of the statement, simply and literally because, for one reason, it suggests that it means that the Christian must be “free and easy” and have a flabby and indulgent attitude towards anybody who vaguely uses the designation – Christian.
However, the proper and reasonable interpretation of this passage (Matt. 7:1) has reference to judging another’s motives, and not to judging the right or wrong of an act.
This is because, it is an established Christian doctrine that God alone is competent to read men’s innermost thoughts, (see Heb. 4:12). Looking thus on man’s heart, God loves the sinner, but hates the sin. And, because man is able to discern only the outward appearance, and not the heart, it is inevitable for him to make mistakes. Jesus does not in this statement, nor in any other in the Scripture, refer to that fine sense of discrimination by which the true believer is able to distinguish between right and wrong (Rev. 3:18), but rather to the habit of censorious sharp and usually unjust criticism.
Again, the Christian must always remember that the measure we give, will be the measure, we receive, for injustice provokes injustice. And, more than that, the injustice of one man towards his fellow man, provokes divine judgment, as Jesus taught in the parable of the unforgiving servant (Matt, 18:23-35) the Christian may condemn an offence, but like God, he must ever be ready to forgive the offender. He can extend mercy to the offender without in any way condoning that evil that has been done.
THE END