Should Christians Judge?

A reflection with a little help from my good friend, Augustine of Hippo.

One of the common sentiments I hear from Christians is, “I can’t judge.” The idea is that we shouldn’t judge the behavior of other people because we ourselves are sinners. This perspective is rooted in Matthew 7:1-5:

Do not judge, so that you may not be judged. ²For with the judgment you make you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get. ³Why do you see the speck in your neighbor’s eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? ⁴Or how can you say to your neighbor, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ while the log is in your own eye? ⁵You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye.

When is judgment appropriate?

Does Jesus mean we should never judge anyone? Not likely. In other passages, Matthew represents moral and spiritual judgment as good, even necessary. For example:

• Jesus teaches his followers how to distinguish true prophets from false ones (7:15-20). False prophets, he says, are like wolves in sheep’s clothing. They represent a danger to the community.

• Jesus tells his disciples they must distinguish between worthy and unworthy houses when they visit. After leaving those that are unworthy, they are to shake the dust off their feet (10:13-14).

• Jesus teaches his followers how to reprove other believers who sin against them (18:15-20).

• John the Baptist confronts Herod Antipas for having a sexual relationship with Herodias, his brother’s wife which, apart from being sinful, is super cringe (14:4).

Each of these instances requires some kind of judgment of true and false, good and bad, sinful and righteous. Scripture teaches us that Jesus wants us to make these kinds of distinctions. There’s nothing wrong with exercising moral judgment. In fact it’s necessary for us to live in keeping with God’s will.

Likewise Paul teaches us to be discerning with regard to sin, particularly within the community of faith. He himself condemns factions in the church in 1 Corinthians 3. He castigates the same church for failing to exercise discipline in the case of a man who was living with his father’s wife (also super cringe). He even writes, “For though absent in body, I am present in spirit; and as if present I have already pronounced judgment in the name of the Lord Jesus on the man who has done such a thing” (1 Cor 5:3-4).

Moral judgment, then, is both good and necessary. In fact we exercise moral judgment all the time. When we discipline our kids, we are exercising (hopefully good) moral judgment. When we make decisions about what to watch on Netflix, when we walk into the voting booth, when we give money to charitable causes, we exercise our moral faculties. To say “I can’t judge” when we face some moral decision isn’t kindness. It’s paralysis, often born of fear. I suspect when we say, “I can’t judge,” what we typically mean is, “I don’t want to make a decision about this,” or, more likely, “I don’t want others to know what decision I’ve already made.”

Confrontation may be necessary.

Not only is it necessary to use good judgment, but it may be necessary for us to confront evil when we see it. This can be very uncomfortable. In The City of God, Augustine talks about our tendency to avoid doing so:

For all too often we wrongly shy away from our obligation to teach and admonish them [people doing evil], and sometimes even to rebuke and correct them. We shy away either because we are unwilling to make the effort or because we hesitate to offend their dignity or because we want to avoid enmities that might impede and harm us with respect to some temporal things which our desire still longs to acquire or which our weakness still fears to lose (I.9).

He continues, arguing that if we shy away from confronting others because we are waiting for the right time, or we are afraid we might drive them into deeper sin, or out of concern that our rebuke will create a stumbling block for others, “this does not appear to be a pretence of desire but rather a counsel of love” (I.9). In other words, we have to be judicious in addressing sin in another person. It has to be done with care, in the right time, and in the right way. Nevertheless, he says, we often fail to provide correction to others not out of love, but because we don’t care enough to do so. We are not being kind or concerned. We are being negligent. (Let’s admit it: this one stings a bit.)

Judgment and Humility

In light of all this, how should we understand Jesus’ admonition, “Do not judge, so that you may not be judged”? The next sentence is clarifying. “For with the judgment you make you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get.” In essence, he means you shouldn’t apply a standard to anyone else that you aren’t willing to apply to yourself. If you are harsh and unforgiving with others, God will be harsh and unforgiving with you. If you are kind and forgiving of others’ wrongdoing, God will be likewise kind and forgiving. “Justice for thee and mercy for me” doesn’t cut it.

Photo by Tima Miroshnichenko: https://www.pexels.com/photo/eyeglasses-on-the-bible-5199818/

Augustine contrasts the city of God with the city of man. The city of God consists of those who have received the saving, transforming grace of God. The city of man, or the “earthly city,” consists of the unredeemed. He describes the city of God as “on pilgrimage among the ungodly” (I, preface). In other words, those who have received God’s saving grace live among those who have not.

The two cities differ vastly, not least in their approaches to power, pride, and humility. The city of man, he writes, thinks it is free and powerful, but its people are in fact slaves, “under the dominion of its very lust for domination” (I. preface). (Augustine could turn a phrase.)

By contrast, one of the chief characteristics of the city of God is humility:

But by humility we reach a height—a height not grasped by human arrogance but granted by divine grace—which transcends all these earthly pinnacles that totter with the shifts of time. For the king and founder of the city of which we are going to speak has made known, in the Scripture of his people, a provision of divine law which asserts, God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble (Jas 4:6) (I. preface).

Thus in our approach to the earthly city, those in the city of God must not adopt a spirit of pride, lest we exchange our freedom in Christ for slavery to our ego and desires.

Jesus’ words are a warning against self-righteousness, much like the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector (Luke 18:9-14). Once we cross the threshold of God’s kingdom, we will begin to live differently than we did before, but Scripture reminds us not to think too highly of ourselves. We are saved not by our goodness, but God’s kindness. One step we can take to remind ourselves of the need for humility is to pray the Prayer of Humble access each time we take Holy Communion:

We do not presume to come to this your table, O merciful Lord,
trusting in our own righteousness,
but in your abundant and great mercies.
We are not worthy so much as to gather up
the crumbs under your table;
but you are the same Lord
whose character is always to have mercy.
Grant us, therefore, gracious Lord,
so to eat the flesh of your dear Son Jesus Christ,
and to drink his blood,
that our sinful bodies may be made clean by his body,
and our souls washed through his most precious blood,
and that we may evermore dwell in him, and he in us.  Amen.

Your enemy may become your friend.

Augustine urges us to remember “that among those very enemies [of Christ] are hidden some who will become citizens [of the city of God], and do not think it fruitless to bear their enmity until they come to confess the faith” (I.35). He continues, “for even among our most open adversaries there lie hidden, still unknown even to themselves, some who are predestined to be friends” (I.35). In other words, we don’t know who will change and come to Christ. We don’t know at this moment which denizens of the earthly city will come to inhabit the city of God. Think about that: someone who stands for everything you oppose, who does everything in his or her power to destroy what is most precious to you, may someday be your brother or sister in Christ, even your close friend. God has done even greater works than this.

Lately on that wacky and troublesome platform known as X, news has spread of a few high-profile people such as Nala Ray and Russell Brand who have made a public confession of Christ after years of rebellion against him. The response of many Christians has been one of skepticism, sometimes rebuke. In the case of Brand, for example, some suggest that his newfound faith is meant to divert attention from allegations that he committed acts of sexual abuse. Is that true? I don’t know. God knows, and if Brand did these things, he should face appropriate consequences. I do know this, though: “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick” (Mark 3:17). When enemies of Christ indicate their desire to come into the city of God, we should do all we can to foster their faith. If it all turns out to be a grift, then we have been duped, but it is worth being duped many times to welcome one sinner into the kingdom.

Yes, we must judge sin and confront it. The exercise of moral judgment is part of the Christian life. In fact, it’s part of everyone’s life. Christians differ in employing a particular set of moral standards that are rooted in Scripture. Yet Christ died for us while we were yet sinners (Rom 5:8), and so we must guard our hearts against pride. If we see the speck in our neighbor’s eye, we have to deal with the log in our own. If we are unwilling to forgive, God will not forgive us. The measure we give will be the measure we get.