Read with Me
James 4:11-12 (HCSB)
Don’t criticize one another, brothers. He who criticizes a brother or judges his brother criticizes the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. There is one lawgiver and judge who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor?
Listen with Me
James continues to point out the errors that have led to divisions and conflicts within the Church. And now he points to slander and the judging of others from which it springs.
James’ viewpoint is that slandering our brother or sister or judging him or her is actually sitting in judgment on the law itself, because judging others usurps God’s own authority as the key lawgiver, the only valid interpreter of the law, and the only one who is qualified to judge another, because He is perfectly holy. Therefore, no one is to sit in judgment of his brother or sister, or to slander them for whatever shortcomings are seen.
Jesus himself spoke about this in the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 7:1-5:
“Do not judge, so that you won’t be judged. or with the judgment you use, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye but don’t notice the log in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ and look, there’s a log in your eye? Hypocrite! First take the log out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.”
The point being made by both Jesus and James is that instead of closely investigating the lives and hearts of those around us, we need to check out our own hearts to make sure that they are clean and remain clean. Some make the excuse that they are only pointing out their brother’s sin so that they will repent. But Jesus’ and James’ instruction is valid in that case as well. First of all, if my heart is not pure, my motives are questionable. And from a place of unclean heart and impure motives, I can’t help anyone else toward purity.
The sign of an unclean heart and impure motives is the harshness with which a person in that state addresses the shortcomings of others, their critiques dividing and discouraging rather than building up. Such a person must stop “helping” in such destructive ways and see to their own failings and faults. Only then, from a humbled heart made clean by genuine repentance and the work of the Holy Spirit, can any real help be given to others.
Pray with Me
Father, it is easy for all of us to see the faults of others, while at the same time being completely blind to our own shortcomings and failures. But You are absolutely right that until we are clean and holy ourselves, we have no right or authority to criticize anyone else. Help me, Lord, to see myself with clear eyes, to willingly confess any shortcomings or sins of action or attitude that I see in myself and allow Your Spirit to keep me clean and holy inside and out. Then if from that place I see another who is struggling, help me to never criticize or slander them to themselves or to others, but to simply walk alongside them in love as I help them along their own journey to wholeness and holiness. Amen.