You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else… Or do you show contempt for the riches of (God’s) kindness, tolerance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness leads you to repentance? Romans 2:1,4

Accept one-another, just as Jesus accepts you. Romans 15:7

God is a reconciler…a God who accepts us because Jesus became sin for us so that in Him we become the righteousness of God. “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us; so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor 5:21). As “the righteousness of God” Jesus became the instrument of our reconciliation to God (v. 18). As the “righteousness of God” in Jesus we become God’s instruments of other peoples’ reconciliation (v. 19).

The outcome? “we no longer regard anyone from a worldly point of view” (v. 16) because “if anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation: The old has gone, the new has come!” (v. 17). So we can accept one-another, just as Jesus accepts us (Rom 15:7).

So in light of all of this, which is probably been read and understood by most Christians, why do we have problems with judging in the Body of Christ? Probably, a lot of it has to do with our not believing that God has truly reconciled us to Himself, or that Jesus death on the cross is all we need to make us new creations.

Being judgmental is a sure sign of unbelief. Unbelief in what? Firstly, unbelief in the power of God. (That God has the power to save us, to reconcile us, to make us new creations. Unbelief that He can take care of our own sin as well as anyone else’s. 2 Cor 9:8)).

Secondly, it’s belief in our own righteousness. (Belief that we’ve got it more together than our brother or sister. Belief that we have more ability than the Holy Spirit to ‘fix’ our brother or sister. (Rom 14:4)

But a lot of us have fallen into that at times. Why’s that? Because our God is too small, and we are too big (as we said above). Because we’re prideful; because we’re just plain annoyed at other peoples’ immaturity (impatience) or inability to see the truth the way we do—and yes, theologians fall into this trap.

And perhaps, most of all, because we rightly see ourselves as instruments of God, but mistakenly see ourselves as instruments of His judgement rather than instruments of His love. Instruments of His reconciling power.

So how to we deal with judging…either in ourselves toward others, or being on the receiving end? We’ll look at that next time.