I recently picked up a book called "unChristian". It's an intereseting look at what average people think about Christians. Basically, they don't think we're representing Jesus well. As followers of Christ, they think we act very unChristian.
The top three observations of Christians is that we are homophobic, judgmental, and hypocrites.
As we wrap up this series in this message transcript, we'll see that if we Christians would just change one thing and get this issue of judging others right, it would help with all three of these disturbing perceptions people have about Christians.
We’ve been talking about judging, and as Christians, most of us have this misunderstanding that we judge those outside the church, and because of God’s grace, we are not supposed to judge those inside. We don’t like it when we’re judged, judging others never seems to help, and doesn’t the Bible say “Do not judge, lest you be judged.” So we think we’re not supposed to judge and if we do judge others, whether we say it or just give people the impression that we’re judging them, we judge those outside of the church because they are a whole lot worse than we are. And once you get into our circle of faith we love you and there’s so much grace and forgiveness. And the prevailing thinking about our fellow believers is “I’m not perfect just forgiven.” But for those people outside the church, we have far less understanding, far less grace, and far less forgiveness, because they don’t act as Christian as we do.
And last week God opened our eyes to the fact that we have got it all backwards. No wonder people think Christians are anti-homosexual, judgmental, and hypocritical. The Apostle Paul made it crystal clear to us that we are not to judge outsiders, those outside the church because who will judge them?
God will judge the outsiders. But we have a responsibility to judge those inside the church. And as we saw last week, we don’t judge every little detail and every little failure. But when someone inside the church chooses a lifestyle of sin, then they become a candidate for someone to talk to them. Because choosing a lifestyle of sin as a Christian is like trying to embrace Jesus and grace and forgiveness and holiness with one arm and sin, death, and evil with the other. It just doesn’t work and someone needs to talk through that with our fellow brother or sister. And boy, we’ve learned a lot these past two weeks haven’t we? We don’t judge to punish, we judge our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ to purify the church and lead them to repentance. And if we did that, the church would be a lot less hypocritical.
Now as we wrap up this series today, we’ll again talk about how there is a godly way to do this. We’ve thrown little hints at how to do this over the last few weeks. We said, before you judge someone else, first judge yourself and first remove the sin from your own life, remove the plank from your eye, then you will be able to see clearly enough to help your brother. Last week we also said that we can’t have the wrong attitude when we do this and unless we are grieved and our hearts are broken, perhaps this isn’t the time or we aren’t ready to help our brother. But when we are so hurt by what our brother is doing and how he is treating his Savior by his lifestyle choice, that we can go to them with a tear in our eye and say, “Fred, we need to talk.”
Turn with me to Matthew 18:12
I want you to see God the Father’s heart in all this and one practical way to do this.
“What do you think? If a man owns a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go to look for the one that wandered off? And if he finds it, I tell you the truth, he is happier about that one sheep than about the ninety-nine that did not wander off. In the same way your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should be lost.
(Catch the Father’s heart here. If he has 10 billion children and one of them has wandered off. He will leave the 9 billion 999milliion 999thouand 999 and go look for his lost child. This is the Father’s heart in all of this. This is why Jesus came to the earth and died for your sins and for mine.
“If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over. But if he will not listen, take one or two others along, so that ‘every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, treat him as you would a pagan or a tax collector.
We’ve talked about this verse before in Nov of 2006. And I know you all remember that message.
No one confronts people in the church. No one does this. But for our church family, I want this to be a part of our DNA. Why because I like to confront people, No. Because this is the Father’s heart. That if one of his sheep goes astray, more than just a mistake, more than just stumbling. But if one of his sheep chooses the wrong path and wanders far far away. The Father would leave the flock and go seek after the one lost sheep.
Let me close by telling you two things.
One, this past week the elders met and made a commitment to do a better job at watching over each of us who call Christ’s Church our home. We will be calling you or catching you at church or just sitting down for a Starbucks maybe once a month to pray for you and see how you’re doing. And if you’re weary and you begin to wander away from God, we want to be there for you and remind you how much the father loves you and longs for you to choose His love and choose to be a part of this family.
Second, we can’t do this alone. You know things about each other that we will never know because you confide in a group of friends here and you tell them things you will never tell me or one of the elders. Will you be someone who follows the Father’s heart and when you know someone is wandering away from the flock, will you be the one to call them back, and with a tear in your eye, remind them how much the Father loves them and wants them to come back to the flock. Maybe they don’t even come to this church. It doesn’t matter. The Father still loves them and needs us to call them home. This is family. This is what our Father desires of us.
So let's just do it. It's your job and my job to seek and save the lost. When a fellow Christian begins to adopt a lifestyle or sin, a lifestyle contrary to what we know God wants, it's up to us to go after them. Even if it means judging them, even if it means confronting them, the Father wouldn't let them wander without going after them. The Father would never give up on them. And neither will we. Amen. Amen.
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