Welcome back to another inspirational moment from historical Christian romance novels.

Matthew 7:1-5- “Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgment, you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you. Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but don’t notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is a log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.”

I love reading the words Jesus spoke. They are filled with wisdom and push us to take a hard look at the state of our own heart. His words cautioning us to not pass judgement on others are easier said than done for us.

I can imagine I am not the only one who struggles with making assumptions and quickly passing judgement. Even with the simplest thing like, “I can’t believe she wore that outfit to a church event.” Oh yeah, I’ve been guilty of that thought many times in my life.

In this week’s book club discussion of Kathleen Ball’s novella, The Settlers: Juan, we meet Sonia. She is a young woman who is battered and bruised by the judgement of others. One mistake in her young life left her abandoned and barely surviving.

While reading this story, I was saddened by the lack of grace and abundance of judgement and condemnation that towns people had for Sonia. It brought me right back to Matthew 7:1-5. God reminded me again how only He has the right to judge and condemn, because only He is holy and blameless.

It is easy to become trapped in the same mindset of the Pharisees; looking down on others who have sinned without seeing our own. Honestly, Jesus’s words paint a rather ridiculous picture of how we must look sometimes. I mean just picture us with giant planks sticking out as we try to wipe a speck of dust from our friend’s eye. Who by the way is standing there thinking ‘Seriously, can they not see the big blaring sin with red blinking lights right in front of their nose?’

Okay, now that we’ve all had a laugh at ourselves, let’s get to the tough stuff. It’s time we lay our judgements down and treat others the way God treats us, with grace, love, and mercy.

I’ll leave you with this final thought, the closer we draw to God, the more we reflect Him, the easier it is to lay down our judgment of others.