LOVE- Champions by the Fruit of the Spiritနမူနာ

Love vs Judgmental Attitude

Bible story: Speck of dust and plank "Matthew 7:1-5"

Theme Verse: Matthew 7:1-2

Welcome to lesson two of CHAMPIONS, where we will continue to look at ways to show LOVE as a spiritual fruit. Knowing about love will NOT win you any matches, but actively showing love is what matters. Today's fight is against "judgmental attitudes". This is having critical and disapproving thoughts towards others.

This attitude is everywhere, even in churches, and sometimes it is encouraged! However, being judgmental is a sin. Jesus warns us NOT to judge. Jesus faced this problem and covered it in His teachings. The reason we should not judge others is that we all have sinned. To point out the faults of others is similar to saying that you do not have any faults. This is where judging is very wrong because who is without sin? None of us!

In Jesus' story, there is a man with a speck of dust in his eye. Another person comes along and offers to help him take the speck of dust out of his eye. It sounds wonderful. It sounds like this person is being kind, helping someone with a problem.

However, Jesus says, "NO, you hypocrite!" It was because he had a speck in his own eye! Only it was not a speck, but a HUGE piece of wood! It is hard to imagine that. In fact, it might be impossible to have a whole plank of wood in the eye. Maybe Jesus was using an extreme example to make His point. We should not judge people's problems, because all the while we have larger problems than they do.

Being judgmental is one of the sins that might be "in our eye" making it impossible for us to see. We think we have life all figured out, but we are walking around with a huge plank of wood in our eye.

This is not a hard lesson to understand, but it is a VERY hard lesson to live. We do not get any knockouts or win any matches for understanding not to judge others. We win when we LIVE it.

Let us stop judging one another!

Questions:

1. How many second chances should I give?

2. What does it mean to be a hypocrite?

3. When is it okay to judge others?

Life Application:

Tell someone "Good job" and compliment them for something good that you see. Bring a small pocket mirror around with you all day. When you are tempted to judge someone, take out the pocket mirror and look at yourself. Remind yourself that you do not need to help others fix their faults today.