Judging Others

"Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye."
- Matthew 7:1-5

"Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.

Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:
Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,
but made himself nothing,
taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
and became obedient to death—
even death on a cross!"
- Philippians 2:3-8

I'm so guilty of judging others, not regarding others as better than myself... when God Himself humbled Himself and served us, only to receive the judgment that we rightly deserve...

I randomly heard this story on the radio (99.5 FM they have some good stuff at times) and it really.. was.. moving. So I thought I'd share this story of a pastor that was speaking.

So as a preacher, the pastor was used to people sleeping during his sermons, but there was this ONE man who would fall asleep week after week without fail. The moment his sermon started the guy just knocked out. He always came with his wife who was very attentive and so the pastor figured that the wife dragged this nonspiritual husband to church week after week. After awhile, his wife came up to him one day after service and said she wanted to talk to the pastor. The pastor thought that she needed some counsel on how to deal with her unbelieving husband.

And so they met. To his surprise, the wife came to say thanks to the pastor. She thanked him for preaching the word of God because her husband really enjoys his preaching. Her husband was a severe cancer patient who had to take medicine right before church to be able to come and that medicine made him really sleepy.. How shocked, foolish, and guilty the pastor must have felt!

We all do it. We just look at these people and attribute them whatever we wish to, without even trying to get to know them, never seeing the huge plank in our eyes... Let us humble ourselves before God and before others. There is NOTHING good in us. NOTHING. I must remind myself this constantly. Only GOOD I have is CHRIST.