Leave the Judging to Jesus
John 8:7-9 NIV
"....'Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.' Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground. At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there."
Every now and then, I find myself in situations where I'm tempted to throw stones at someone. Not real stones, like in the scripture, but with my words or actions. What I mean by this is that I'm tempted to judge someone. Usually, this judgment is based off of an accusation made by myself or someone else, a rumor I've heard, or even by the choices that person makes. Like the Pharisees who brought a woman caught in the act of adultery before Jesus with the intentions of punishing her for her mistake, I too tend to think it's my place to judge another for their wrongdoing. However, when we read the story behind John 8, we will see that we are no better than anyone else. When Jesus gave them the go-ahead and stone the woman, with this one stipulation, everyone began to leave. This crowd was humbled by Jesus' subtle reminder that they, too, were sinners themselves.
It is crucial to remember that just because someone's sin may be bigger than ours, we are no better than them because we are also sinners. Who are you, and who am I, to hold anyone's iniquities against them when the ruler of the universe forgives them? How ugly would it be for us to punish someone for their sin when Jesus Christ forgives us for ours? If we don't humble ourselves and run our own race, then we will fall victim to a sin much worse... judgment. There is only one right and just judge and that is Christ. We don't have to agree with the things that other people choose to do, but what we can do is leave the judging up to Jesus (John 5:28-30) and love people anyways. In this race we call life, love wins every time!
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