We have heard it said over and over and over: you are judging and that is wrong. Now to be sure there are times when we are to judge and to judge righteously when we discern error. However, in this chapter Paul over and over and over is trying to get our attention that when we judge or criticize another’s spiritual walk we have crossed the no-man’s zone of hypocrisy.
Paul asks “who are you to judge the servant of another?” and “why do you judge your brother?” And in the context of this discussion Paul is referring to three non-essentials of food, days and drink. Not one of these will keep us from heaven’s door but alone or together they may cause a brother/sister to stumble in their walk with Jesus. The problem is us not them. We have this urge to change others rather than accepting them as they are. Instead of a gentle quiet spirit we become a gonging cymbal as we beat our drum of “no, no, no” to those who may not be at the same maturity level as us all the while forgetting two essentials:
- We all will stand before God to give an accounting
- We will give an account of every idle word we have spoken
What we need to remember is that God looks not on the outward man as we do but on his heart. Let’s let God do the judging and we do the accepting lest we scar hearts God has already healed.