Matt. VII: 1-6.
Fault-finding is not in itself a sin; on the contrary, it is often a duty. The old Levitical law said: "Thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbor, and not suffer sin upon him." Under the New Testament law of love there is the exhortation: "Reprove, rebuke, with all long-suffering and doctrine;" but, as some one has well said, "A duty may become a sin if wrongfully done." The spirit of the Christian is the spirit of love and gentleness. Yet there are times when he must rebuke sin and take no compromising position in the presence of evil. To be censorious, however, is to be un-Christlike and disobedient to His wish.
There are certain thing to be said about mote-pulling and beam-pulling. The first is:
I. Take care that you get them in the right order. Beam-pulling comes first. "First cast out the beam that is in thine own eye." Following that simple direction would stop a lot of mote-pulling. "Physician, heal thy self." "Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest; for wherein thou judgest an other, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things."
II. Secondly, bear in mind that mote-pulling is dangerous business. In judging others we court judgment on ourselves. A Spanish proverb says: "If our faults were written on our foreheads we should have to go with out hats pulled over our eyes." Another familiar proverb says that "people who live in glass houses ought not to throw stones."
"Before you mark another's sin
Bid thine own conscience look within."
Mote-pulling is often the unconscious result of an unforgiving spirit. If we do not forgive others God cannot forgive us. So, both from his fellowmen and from God, there is danger to the man who judges his brother.
III. Thirdly, mote-pulling is frequently a very hypocritical performance. If we have studied ourselves carefully most of us have found that in proportion as we have become quick to discern the faults of others we have less and less discerned our own shortcomings. Frequently when we have found faults in others they were but reflections of faults in our own lives. "It takes a rogue to catch a rogue." There are a good many sins that, if we did not indulge so much ourselves, we would not see so plainly in others.
IV. Fourthly, mote-pulling is often times a most useless performance. It certainly is useless so long as there is plainly visible inconsistency, in our own lives.
V. Therefore, mote-puller, take care. It is a delicate matter to pluck a mote or a cinder out of an inflamed eye. Take care how you do it. First be sure your hands are clean. That does not mean we must live sinless lives before we begin to help others; but it does mean that we must be right with God, and right with our fellowmen. Take care that you do your mote-pulling very tenderly and gently, also. It requires a great art of tact and tenderness to help a brother by finding fault with him, though it can be done.
VI. Before your begin change places. It is best to begin that way; for you will have to change places before you get through. "For with what measure ye mete it shall be measured unto you again." As a man soweth in his judgment of others, so shall he reap.
VII. Put on charity as a garment. Recognizing the danger, the delicacy, the importance of the work; being in right relations with God and with your fellowmen; resolve on great tact and tenderness, with a clear conscience, clean hands and clothed in the white robes of charity, you are in a condition, like Christ, to do good in the ministry of reproof. Do not forget this last condition: Put on charity as a garment. "Charity suffereth long" etc.
Showing posts with label Matthew. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Matthew. Show all posts
Sunday, February 24, 2008
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Judgment Day
1910
Judgment or Blessing Today Yours To Choose — Matthew 25:31-46
That there is a day of judgment is a fact, but it is difficult, and not so important to decide the exact nature or time of the coming of the Lord to judgment. It is said in Matt 24:29-34 that "this generation shall not pass away till all these things be accomplished," and it is repeated in Mark 13:30, Luke 21:32, and again in Matt. 16:28, "there are some of them that stand here, which shall in no wise taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom," when "the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels, and then shall he render unto every man according to his deeds."
This must refer to the destruction of Jerusalem and the end of the old dispensation or age, and the coming of the gospel dispensation. But it does not exclude the great and final coming and judgment day at the end of that age.
There is really a judgment day at every great crisis of the nation or of our lives, at death, at the coming of rewards or punishments for our actions, at every time of decision. For instance, we have seen within the last few years many persons who have been for years growing rich by graft and dishonesty and have suddenly met their judgment day, while others have been reaping the rewards of faithful service. So young men who have been going on in course of drinking and rioting for a long time, suddenly find themselves drunkards, in ill health, incapacitated for their best work. They have been brought up at a judgment day; while those who have resisted temptation and been faithful and true are also reaping their rewards.
Then shall the king say unto them on his right hand. The sheep, the righteous. Come. Draw near to your Elder Brother, to your Father, to your home, for here is the place for you. Ye blessed of my Father means exactly "my Father's blessed ones," denoting not simply that they have been blessed by him, but that they are his. Blessings innumerable had come to them through their being willing to become his children and accept the kind of blessings he had to bestow, such as his loving care, the bestowal of the Holy Spirit, the experiences of the gospel, the renewal of the heart, the bestowal by the Spirit, the power to become children and heirs of God, the gifts and fruits of the Spirit, eternal life, the favor of God, the rest in the everlasting arms, the pavilion under the shadow of his wings.
Receive not by purchase, or by labors, but by becoming children of God, like God, and therefore heirs of God, and joint heirs with Jesus Christ Every one must be the heir of him whose child he is. He that is a child of sin is an heir of sin; a child of the devil inherits from the devil; a child of goodness and of God inherits from God. The kingdom of heaven, the kingdom which consists in righteousness, peace, joy in the Holy Ghost (Rom. 14:17), in which saints reign over infinite forces and powers to make them minister to happiness and good: "All things are yours," because "ye are Christ's."
Ye have done it unto me, the poor and needy and sick, and all the classes whom Jesus helped in Palestine are his representatives now on earth. The only visible expression of our love to him is through them. What a privilege this is to show our love to our Master. How it enriches our life if we keep in mind that we are not only helping the needy, but expressing our love to our Master. The unconsciousness of the righteous shows that their virtues were sincere and true. Whosoever does good deeds for the sake of the reward deserves no reward, and will obtain none, for the soul of goodness is left out of such deeds.
Unconscious goodness is the highest form of goodness. The beginner in music counts his measures, and studies on what note he shall place each finger; but the perfect musician strikes the right notes and expresses the right emotions almost as naturally as he breathes or as the birds warble their morning songs.
The cause of the doom was the refusal to do the deeds that belong to the heavenly kingdom and to be ruled by its motives. They refused to be fit for heaven. They decided to live selfish lives. The plan of their lives was such that all the evils of society — graft, child labor, poverty, degradation, crime, oppression, drunkenness, disease, could go on without any effort on their part to put an end to them.
The punishment is like the sin: it omits heaven and joy and God and the companionship of the good from our lives, and adds the everlasting fire.
This is a warning of love. It is a statement of the fact that by the very nature of things sin leads to ruin, and righteousness to heaven. No evil can enter heaven, for if it did heaven would not be heaven any longer.
President Eliot of Harvard, in an address to medical men, said that however people might refuse to believe in a future hell, it was the doctor's business to show young men that if they persisted in certain vices they would find a hell in this life. It is for each of us to make the choice, and start on the way which leads where we wish to go and live forever.
The law of the harvest is "to reap more than you sow."
Judgment or Blessing Today Yours To Choose — Matthew 25:31-46
That there is a day of judgment is a fact, but it is difficult, and not so important to decide the exact nature or time of the coming of the Lord to judgment. It is said in Matt 24:29-34 that "this generation shall not pass away till all these things be accomplished," and it is repeated in Mark 13:30, Luke 21:32, and again in Matt. 16:28, "there are some of them that stand here, which shall in no wise taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom," when "the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels, and then shall he render unto every man according to his deeds."
This must refer to the destruction of Jerusalem and the end of the old dispensation or age, and the coming of the gospel dispensation. But it does not exclude the great and final coming and judgment day at the end of that age.
There is really a judgment day at every great crisis of the nation or of our lives, at death, at the coming of rewards or punishments for our actions, at every time of decision. For instance, we have seen within the last few years many persons who have been for years growing rich by graft and dishonesty and have suddenly met their judgment day, while others have been reaping the rewards of faithful service. So young men who have been going on in course of drinking and rioting for a long time, suddenly find themselves drunkards, in ill health, incapacitated for their best work. They have been brought up at a judgment day; while those who have resisted temptation and been faithful and true are also reaping their rewards.
Then shall the king say unto them on his right hand. The sheep, the righteous. Come. Draw near to your Elder Brother, to your Father, to your home, for here is the place for you. Ye blessed of my Father means exactly "my Father's blessed ones," denoting not simply that they have been blessed by him, but that they are his. Blessings innumerable had come to them through their being willing to become his children and accept the kind of blessings he had to bestow, such as his loving care, the bestowal of the Holy Spirit, the experiences of the gospel, the renewal of the heart, the bestowal by the Spirit, the power to become children and heirs of God, the gifts and fruits of the Spirit, eternal life, the favor of God, the rest in the everlasting arms, the pavilion under the shadow of his wings.
Receive not by purchase, or by labors, but by becoming children of God, like God, and therefore heirs of God, and joint heirs with Jesus Christ Every one must be the heir of him whose child he is. He that is a child of sin is an heir of sin; a child of the devil inherits from the devil; a child of goodness and of God inherits from God. The kingdom of heaven, the kingdom which consists in righteousness, peace, joy in the Holy Ghost (Rom. 14:17), in which saints reign over infinite forces and powers to make them minister to happiness and good: "All things are yours," because "ye are Christ's."
Ye have done it unto me, the poor and needy and sick, and all the classes whom Jesus helped in Palestine are his representatives now on earth. The only visible expression of our love to him is through them. What a privilege this is to show our love to our Master. How it enriches our life if we keep in mind that we are not only helping the needy, but expressing our love to our Master. The unconsciousness of the righteous shows that their virtues were sincere and true. Whosoever does good deeds for the sake of the reward deserves no reward, and will obtain none, for the soul of goodness is left out of such deeds.
Unconscious goodness is the highest form of goodness. The beginner in music counts his measures, and studies on what note he shall place each finger; but the perfect musician strikes the right notes and expresses the right emotions almost as naturally as he breathes or as the birds warble their morning songs.
The cause of the doom was the refusal to do the deeds that belong to the heavenly kingdom and to be ruled by its motives. They refused to be fit for heaven. They decided to live selfish lives. The plan of their lives was such that all the evils of society — graft, child labor, poverty, degradation, crime, oppression, drunkenness, disease, could go on without any effort on their part to put an end to them.
The punishment is like the sin: it omits heaven and joy and God and the companionship of the good from our lives, and adds the everlasting fire.
This is a warning of love. It is a statement of the fact that by the very nature of things sin leads to ruin, and righteousness to heaven. No evil can enter heaven, for if it did heaven would not be heaven any longer.
President Eliot of Harvard, in an address to medical men, said that however people might refuse to believe in a future hell, it was the doctor's business to show young men that if they persisted in certain vices they would find a hell in this life. It is for each of us to make the choice, and start on the way which leads where we wish to go and live forever.
The law of the harvest is "to reap more than you sow."
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