Matthew chapter 7. Now, we know
that this is the Lord's Sermon on the Mount. This is what we've
been studying in our Bible lesson. And we come now to chapter 7
and verse 1, and the Lord says, Judge not that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge,
ye shall be judged. And with what measure ye measure,
it shall be measured to you again. And why beholdest thou the mote
that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam
that is in thine own eye? Or how wilt thou say to thy brother,
Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye, And behold, a beam
is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, first cast out
the beam out of thine own eye, And then shalt thou see clearly
to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye. Give not that
which is holy unto the dogs, Neither cast ye your pearls before
swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again,
and rend you. Ask, and it shall be given you.
Seek, and ye shall find. Knock, and it shall be opened
unto you. For every one that asketh receiveth, and he that
seeketh findeth. And to him that knocketh it shall
be opened. For what man is there of you
Whom, if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he
ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If ye then, being
evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much
more shall your Father, which is in heaven, give good things
to them that ask him? Therefore, all things whatsoever
ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them. For this is the law and the prophets. Now, let's start here in verse
1. Judge not that ye be not judged. Now, what does our Lord mean
here when He speaks of judging not? To judge. Look over with
me at James chapter 4. James chapter 4. He says in verse 11, Speak not
evil one of another, brethren. Speak not evil one of another. This is what it is to judge. It's to determine. there's something
evil in your brother. It's for you or I to determine
there's something evil in him. Speak not evil one of another
brethren. He that speaketh evil of his
brother, and judgeth his brother, speaketh evil of the law, and
judgeth the law. But if thou judge the law, thou
art not a doer of the law, but a judge. There's one lawgiver. There's one lawgiver. Who is
that? It's God. God gave the law. And not only, and he, what purpose
did he give that law for? He gave the law to shut our mouths,
to declare us guilty before God, to declare that there's none
righteous, no, not one, to declare that there's nothing good in
us. That's why he gave it. Now we're
going to take that law that he gave to shut our mouths and open
up our mouths and speak and condemn our brother. The law speaks to
me. I need to be hearing what the
law says to me. I'm not concerned. My concern is not to go to the
law and tell you what the law says to you, what the law says
to me. We need to hear what the law says to us personally. And
he says here, He's able to save. This one who gave the law, he's
able to save. Who's going to make our brother
hear the law? He does. The one who gave it. He's able to save. He's able
to regenerate and make a believer hear the law. Make him hear what
the law says to him. And flee to Christ for mercy.
And he's able to destroy. Who art thou that judges another? You remember in Romans 14.4,
you can look over there with me, Paul, when he was speaking
to the Romans, writing this letter to the Romans, look what he said
in Romans 14.4. He was talking about weak brethren. He was talking about those who
still think that there's some aspect in which they're under
the law. We all start out that way. We're legalists by nature.
We just love to be yoked and we love to yoke. And we have
to be taught by God that we're free in Christ, that he's our
liberty. We're not under the law, we're
under grace. The law's got nothing to say
to you and me anymore. It's done its job. And now in
Christ Jesus, He actively operates in the hearts of His people.
He actively teaches and corrects and rebukes and lifts up and
brings down. He does it. Who's able to save? He is. Isn't that what we just
read in James? Now look here, in Romans 14,
verse 4, He says, Who art thou that judgest another man's servant?
Whose servant are you? Are you God's servant? Is Christ
your master? If Christ is your master, you're
His servant. Now, whose servant are you? To his own master he standeth
or falleth. If I fall, I'm falling before
my master, Christ Jesus. If I stand, I'm standing before
my master, Christ Jesus. Yea, he shall be holding up,
now hear it again, for God is able to make him stand. Who's
going to make His servants stand? The Master. God is. The Son of
God. Christ Jesus, our Master. He's
able to make His people stand. So, when He says here, judge
not, He's saying, Don't yoke him. Don't oppress him. Don't
speak evil of him. Don't exalt yourself over him. God's able to make him stand.
Remember that. God's able to make him stand.
Now look, and he says, and don't do it, that ye be not judged. First of all, when we do that
towards a brother, you know what's going to happen? What did he just say? If you speak evil of a brother,
the fault lies at our door. If I speak evil of my brother,
who's in the greater fault? My brother or me? I am. I'm not trusting the Lord to
raise him up. I'm not trusting Christ to make
him stand. I'm taking the law into my own
hands. I'm exalting myself to the throne of God. Who's at worse
fault there? I am. And he says, For with what
judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged. And with what measure
ye meet it, it shall be measured to you again. Look back over
to James again. And look at chapter 2. James
chapter 2. Here's what I think he's saying.
Verse 12. So speak ye, and so do, as they
that shall be judged by the law of liberty. Christ, who bore
the judgment of His elect? Who bore the wrath of God in
the place of those God determined to save before the foundation
of the world? Christ did. Christ was judged of the Father. Christ bore the condemnation. Christ was made sin and He bore
the eternal wrath of God on behalf of His people. And now His people
have been set free in Christ Jesus. And so we'll be judged
how? By liberty. What does that mean?
If Christ paid your sin debt, if Christ died for you, and He
put away your sin, God promises through the Spirit of God, your
sin will never again be remembered. You're going to be judged in
liberty. My judgment's already passed.
Romans 8.1, there is therefore now, right now, no condemnation
to them which are in Christ Jesus, to them that walk after the Spirit,
or led of the Spirit of God, or under the dominion of the
Spirit of God. There's no condemnation anymore
for them. You'll be judged by the law of liberty. You're free.
Now look, Verse 13, for he shall have judgment without mercy that
hath showed no mercy. You know who's going to do that?
You know who's going to show judgment without mercy? The man
that don't know anything about mercy. Those that have tasted of the
Lord's grace, they're gracious. Because they know what it's like
to be in that bondage. They know what it's like to be
oppressed. They know what it's like to be held captive. And
now, having been set free by free grace, they're gracious. Sinners don't need to be brought
into bondage. They're in bondage. Believers don't need to be brought
into bondage. They've been brought out of bondage. We need to be
told about who Christ is and how He sets sinners free. And
He says, Mercy rejoiceth against judgment. Don't you rejoice that
you know something about mercy? Don't you rejoice that the Lord
had mercy on you? Don't you rejoice that when you
read in Romans 8, who is He that condemneth? Who's going to lay
anything to the charge of God's elect? It's Christ that died.
It's God that justified His people. Who's going to lay anything to
your charge? Aren't you thankful that it's
mercy, it's God's free mercy to you that causes that to be
so? And isn't that the motivation
and the love that constrains that old legal pharisee that's
in me and that's in you? Isn't that what constrains him
and holds him down and makes you from the inner man delight
to show mercy to your brethren? Isn't that it? Well, that's what
he's saying to us here. With what judgment you judge,
you shall be judged. So, rejoice in mercy. Rejoice in mercy. In other words,
if you've tasted the Lord's grace, when you see a brother that's
fallen, rejoice to know that you're not looking at your brother.
What did Paul say? If I sin, it's no longer I, it's
sin that dwelleth in me. The I is the new man that's created
of God, that's his workmanship. that delights in the law of God,
that wills to serve God, that delights to serve... If you behold
sin in me, it's no longer I that do it, but sin that dwelleth
in me. It's my old man, it's what I
am. So when you look at a brother, instead of speaking evil of him,
rejoice in what God's grace has done for him. You know that that's
the flesh you're looking at. That's the old man you're seeing,
not the new man. So speak evil, not of your brother.
And he says, verse 3, And why beholdest thou the mote that
is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that
is in thine own eye? That's how it starts. See, first
thing we do is we behold a mote. that's in our brother's eye,
a small little something that our brother doesn't do. Satan
goes about as a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. And
this is his playground right here. You find some little fault
with your brother, some little something that your brother doesn't
do just right to suit you. And you begin to think about
it. Think about what he ought to be doing different. And all
the while that you're thinking about that, there's this beam. There's this beam that's just
filling up your own eye. Something far greater, far worse,
far more significant than what you're beholding in your brother.
And you know what it is? It's self-righteousness. It's self-exaltation. It's self-value. It's self-worth. It's a love
and an admiration for good old holy righteous you against your
brother. That's where it starts. And then
it goes on from there. Then you see it. But look at
verse 4. Or how wilt thou say to thy brother,
Let me pull out the moat out of thine eye, Behold, a beam's
in thine own eye. It starts out, you just behold
it in your brother. But as this, you're such a good
fruit examiner. You're able to detect God's produce
so well and detect everything that's wrong with it so well.
Next thing you think is, I can pull it out. I can remove it. Not only do I have the power
to detect evil in my brother, I can get it out of him. I got
the power to get it out of him. Who do you say is able to make
him stand? God is. His master, to his own
master he stands or falls. And see, when that happens, all
you can behold is what's in your brother. All you can behold is
how you could pull it out. But what you can't behold is
the self-righteousness in our own eye and in our own self. Remember now, remember, Christ
Jesus, our Redeemer, paid our debt. He paid the judgment that
was our due. He put away this sin. He even
put away the sin of our self-righteousness and our self-judging and our
self-exalting of ourselves. He put that away too. He's not
saying here that if you judge this way, you're going to be
judged this way. You're going to be cast out because
you judged your brother. He's saying to us brethren, This
is the Word. This is the Master speaking.
And through His Word, this is how He teaches us and corrects
us because it's not possible that one for whom He died can
be cast out, can be judged with the wrath of God. God won't pour
out His wrath on His Son and then turn around and pour it
out on His people again. But it's through this very Word,
it's through the very Word of our Redeemer that He rebukes
us, that He corrects us, He does just what He says. He makes us
to stand in grace and mercy and not in self-righteous judgment.
Verse 5. Thou hypocrite. That's what it
is. It's a hypocrite. It's a hypocritical
thing for me to look on you and speak evil of you when that very
thing is evil. That I'm doing is evil. You see?
First cast out the beam out of thine own eye. Then shalt thou
see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye. How
is that going to happen? How are you going to get that
beam out of your eye? Remember when he said back in chapter
5, when he said, If your right hand offends you, cut it off.
Remember that? If your right eye offends you,
pluck it out. It's better that one member should perish, be
cut off, than that the whole body should perish? What do we
see in that? Christ our Lord is that one member
who, having been willingly made sin by the Father, bore our sin
and was cut off out of the land of the living because it was
better that one member be cut off than that the whole body
should perish. And it's through the Gospel of
Christ, through the Spirit of God, as we behold Christ in His
redemptive glory, sitting at the right hand of God, having
fully, freely accomplished our redemption, that we're turned
from that old man of the flesh, from that old self-righteous,
self-exalting man, and we realize, He saved me He saved me from
the wrath of God. How on earth can I be wrathful
towards my brother? That's how that being, that's
how that self-righteous man is put down. He's put down through
the gospel that declares, you've been redeemed. You're bought
with a price. He's paid all the debts you owe. He's made you righteous. He made
you holy before God. He said, I'll never mention your
sin again. And it's through Christ, by His
work, by His gospel, beholding Him, just as that hand, that's
how that hand is cut off, that's how that eye is plucked out,
that's how that beam is removed out of our eye, that's how that
old self-righteous man is put out. Beholding Christ. So you
know what our Lord's telling us here? If you begin to behold
evil in your brother's eye, or in your brother, go to Christ. Flee to your Redeemer. Pick up
the Word of God and read Romans chapter 8. Who is He that condemneth?
It's Christ that died. It's Christ that's risen. It's
Christ that ever liveth to make intercession for us. Who's going
to separate us from the love of God? We're more than conquerors
through Him that loved us. Go and read a passage like that
and behold that brother in Christ. If you behold Christ,
when you behold that brother, you behold Christ. That's how
one we are with Him. And that's how it'll be taken
out. And then you can see clearly.
You know what happens when all that takes place? When you behold
Christ and we behold our own self-righteousness and our own
self-exalting and all, He rebukes us and He corrects us and He
chastens us and we become so low, we become so humble-minded
as we ought to be. And then, now, having seen Christ,
having been yourself restored to Christ and to behold the beauties
of holiness in Christ Jesus, Now then, now you can go talk
to your brother. Because now you'll go to him
speaking about Christ. You'll go to him telling him
about what Christ has accomplished instead of going to him and saying,
you did this, this, this, and this, now let me fix it. The
only thing that's going to take the beam out of his eye is what
took it out of your eye. What took it out of your eye?
In the first hour when we were going along thinking we were
all our own. That we, it was our will, our
choice, our way, everything about us, us, us, our works. What took
that out of your eye? When you beheld the glory of
God in the face of Christ Jesus. What's going to do it every hour
since then? Beholding the glory of God in
the face of Christ Jesus. What's going to, it's going to,
what's going to do it for your brother? The same thing. Same
thing. Now verse six. He says, Give
not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls
before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn
again and rend you. Now, I've heard a lot of different
things preached on from this, but I think the Lord gave me
some light on this verse, and I want to give it to you. When I behold sin in one of my
brethren. As I just said to you, I'm not
looking at my brother. I'm beholding that dog, that
swine that he still is in his flesh. And when I'm in my being puffed
up in pride and being puffed up in self-righteousness and
thinking that I can detect evil in my brother and I can be a
judge of the law and I can take that beam out, that's the dog
and the swine of my own flesh that's reigning. In fact, it's
the greater dog and the greater swine. If I take the holy things
of God, Every time in that self-righteousness, every time whole churches and
individuals and any time that men try to yoke a professing
believer and make them do what they're going to make them do,
the greater dog and the greater swine is the one that's trying
to do the yoking. And they always take these holy
things. They always use the pearls to
try to do it. And when I do that, if I do that
using scriptures, using these great precious promises of God,
to try to construct, to make you, force you to do something.
I am taking these holy things and these pearls and I'm giving
them to the dog and the swine of my own flesh. And my own self-righteous
spirit, my own flesh will trample them underfoot. That's what I'm
doing. I'm trampling them underfoot. And when you use the word of
God that way, what always happens is, is that old man of the flesh
Just like He says these dogs and these swans will turn and
separate you, they'll rend you in pieces, that old man of the
Spirit always is trying to separate me from Christ, trying to separate
me from the new man, trying to separate, separate me from my
brethren. So you see, if I take these pearls,
these holy things, and I use them, in this yoking, oppressing
way. I'm giving that which is holy
to the dog of my own sinful flesh and the swine of my own sinful
flesh and it won't profit. Now notice this word here too.
He says, neither cast ye your pearls before swine. Sometimes
when we're getting ready to go out to dinner or go to a special
occasion, you fellas listen to me now. your wife comes to you
and she's got that pearl necklace and she says, honey, will you
put these pearls on me? Now, when's the last time you
took that pearl necklace? Those precious pearls, those
costly pearls. When's the last time you took
those and looked at that one you love so dearly? that you
cherish with all your heart, your pride, and you take those
pearls and you sling them at her? One, that's not going to put
them on her. That's not going to adorn her.
You know what's going to happen if you do that? It's going to
be a big fight breakout. That's what's going to happen
if we take these pearls and we throw them at our brethren to
try to correct them. A big fight's gonna break out.
But what do you do instead? You take these pearls and you
carefully, gently put them around her neck, fasten them. You know
why? Because you love her. Those pearls
are costly. and you're putting them on her,
and when you place them on her that way, and she turns around
and looks at you with those pearls on, they adorn her. You make her
beautiful in those pearls. That's what we do with the gospel.
We carefully go to a brother who's weak, to a brother who's
fallen, And rather than cast these pearls at them, we carefully
put them on them, speaking kindly and graciously, teaching them
Christ. And when these pearls are placed
on a brother or sister, you know what happens? They adorn them. They beautify them, make them
lovely. Now look at this 7th verse. Ask, and it shall be given you.
Seek, and you shall find. Knock, and it shall be opened
unto you. Now, he's still talking about
the same thing. Look down at verse 12. How does
he end? Therefore all things whatsoever
you would that men should do to you, do you even so to them.
For this is the law. This is the fulfillment of the
law and the prophets. You wish for your brother to
sling, to speak evil of you, to be a judge of the law, to
try to yoke and oppress you, to cast the pearls and the holy
things at you. to stand in his own wisdom, or
do you wish for your brother and your sister that beholds
you weak and feeble and in need of grace to ask God for wisdom? And then to come to you in a
spirit of meekness and gently, carefully put these pearls on
you. Well, he says, if you lack the wisdom, if you don't know
what to do, you don't understand, you're feeling that old self-righteous
man exalt himself, ask God. Go to Him. He'll give you the
wisdom. You know what He's going to do?
He's going to give you Christ our wisdom. And that's going
to take this self-righteous beam out of your own eyes. And then
He's going to give you the wisdom to know that Christ, our wisdom,
is the only wisdom that's going to make this work. It's going
to do this thing. Now let me show you something.
Turn with me now. Hold your place there in Matthew
7. Turn back over to James, just a moment. James, chapter 1. Let me set something up for you. James, look at verse 1. James,
a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ to the twelve tribes
which are scattered abroad. James was a pastor. This is the Lord's brother. He
was a minister to Jewish brethren. In Acts 21, I think we're going
to see that when Paul came to Jerusalem, James was there, and
many of the elders were there, and they said, Paul, here's our
problem. There's thousands of Jews that
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. They really believe the Lord
Jesus Christ. But they've been under the law
for so long. They think they're still obligated to be under the
law. And they hear, Paul, that you're
preaching and telling folks, preaching in the synagogues to
the Jews and the Gentiles, telling them that they don't have to
circumcise their children anymore. They're not under the law anymore.
And he says, they don't know what to do. They're weak. They're
weak brethren. That's who James is writing to,
to these weak brethren. And he's telling those stronger
brethren in their midst that in all these trials, to be patient. Now watch what he says. My brethren,
verse 2, count it all joy when you fall into different temptations,
knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. You know what that is? In a little
while, in chapter 2, he's going to give Abraham and Rahab as
the example. And I mentioned this last week
to you. You know what the patience was that Abraham had? The example
is faith without works is dead. It's faith without this patience
is dead. Abraham, I'm going to give you
children more in number than the stars in the sky. Abraham,
your Redeemer is coming. and the souls of these children,
these spiritual children I'm going to give you and your own
soul, your own eternal salvation is going to be completely accomplished
by that King and that Redeemer. And that King and that Redeemer
and all those children are coming through your only son Isaac. Now take Isaac and go sacrifice
him to me. That's trial. I have no earthly
idea how it's going to turn out or what the circumstances are
going to be. But this I know, the Hebrew writer
tells us, Abraham accounted. God is able to raise up even
from the dead. What is it not to judge? It's
to know that to his own master he stands or falls. It's to know
that God is able to make him stand. God is able to raise up. And it's to wait on the Lord
to do it. And look what James says. But
let patience have her perfect work, that she may be perfect
in the entire wanting nothing. Wait, so you can see God do this.
And no, God is indeed able. But look at verse 5. And if any
of you lack wisdom, let him ask God, that giveth to all liberally,
and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him. But go ask in faith. Go ask because you want God to
raise up. Go ask because you want God to
have all the glory. Go ask because you want to see
God saved. If you go there saying, ah, this
brother's evil and he's... Lord, teach me how to fix this.
Teach me how I can go fix it. Because you want to get the glory
for it? That's a double-minded man. That's a man that's wavering.
Go ask God, Lord, Do this. I trust you're able to raise
up. And I'll give you a little hint.
This is what we started going through the book of James over
there at Pennsylvania. And this chapter 7 is what got
me looking at James in this light. Matthew chapter 7 got me looking
at James in this light. And if you'll go through the
book and read it, the whole letter is teaching us to patiently wait
on the Lord to raise up. And I'll just walk through, I'm
just going to show you something briefly here. He says, what Eric
read there, at the end of verse 18, he says, of his own will
begat he us with the word of truth. He started this thing. He did this thing. God did. And he says, therefore, Wherefore,
let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to wrath. Your anger is not going to fix
anything. Mine is not either. But don't just hear this word,
be a doer of it, he said. And look down what he says down
here, verse 25. But whoso looketh into the perfect
law of liberty, and continueth. He's not a forgetful hearer.
He's a doer. This man shall be blessed in
his deed. But verse 23, let me see here. Oh, verse 26. And if any man
among you seem to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue,
he goes and he deals in harshness and judgment with a brother.
This man's Religion is vain. He deceived his own heart. Chapter
2, he says, don't be a respecter of persons. That's what you'll
do. The rich man, the man who appears to be outwardly, and
James uses rich and poor throughout this letter, which is, it's not
all just temporal riches. It's talking about that rich
man who outwardly is adorned and has on the jewels and everything.
In other words, you'll begin to treat the brother who outwardly
appears to be walking aright before God differently than you
treat the weaker brother who doesn't realize that Christ is
all. Don't show respect to persons.
And he says, but rejoice in mercy, not judgment. And then he gives
the illustration of Rahab and Abraham, and he says, know that
God's able to raise up. Faith without this work, without
this ability to trust God to raise up, is dead. It's not faith at all. And then
in verse 3, when he says there, brethren, be not many masters,
he's saying the same thing the Lord said when he said, Don't
delight to be called rabbi and master and father. Don't try
to take your seat as God the Father, God the Son, and God
the Holy Spirit doing what only He can do. And he goes all through
that chapter and he says, that's an unbridled tongue, that's the
flesh. And he ends it by saying, but
the wisdom that's from above, verse 17, it's pure, it's peaceable,
it's gentle, it's easy to be entreated, it's full of mercy,
good fruits without partiality, without hypocrisy. And the fruit
of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace. The
pearls are not thrown, they're sown in peace. And he goes all
through, and then in verse 4 we saw there how he said, ask God,
but ask Him not wavering. If you don't receive what you
ask for, if you're still in self-righteousness and you're still having a grudge
against your brother, it's because you haven't asked God because
you really want God to receive it. You still want to receive
it, he said. He said, ask God. He'll give
it to you. And he ends up saying there,
don't judge your brother. You're a judge of the law if
you do that. But trust God who's able to raise up. And then I'm
convinced too here, come down now to chapter 5, verse 13, when
he says, is any among you afflicted? Are you the one who beholds your brother,
weaker brother, and you're afflicted by that self-righteous man that's
wanting to judge him, Wanting to do all that, to yoke Him and
to make Him do it, let Him pray. Ask God. He comes back over and
over throughout the letter. He keeps on with that. Ask God.
And then He says, is any merry? Have you had that beam taken
out of your eye? Have you beheld Christ and you're
rejoicing in Christ and you see Christ? Let Him sing Psalms. Peter? when you're converted,
when that old fleshly, arrogant man's been brought down and you've
been made to see that you don't need to trust in your flesh,
but in Christ Jesus alone who saves, who's able to raise up.
Feed my sheep. Are you married? Do you behold
it? Have you been through the affliction
and you've beheld that Christ indeed is able to raise up? Then
don't go yoke Him, go sing Psalms to Him. Go sing about this full,
complete accomplishment that only Christ can accomplish. Is
any sick among you? Is anybody suffering this thing?
Is anybody the weak brother who's sick and who doesn't behold Christ,
who thinks he's still under the law? Now here's a word to the
pastor. Let him call for the elders of
the church and let them go with that stern look on their face
and in their elderly, priestly, masterly, rabbi, greatest authority
and yoke him and oppress him? No. Let them pray over the whole
matter. Let them go into their closet
and ask God for wisdom, just like the brother does. They're
on the same plane with the brother. Let them go and ask God, just
like everybody else. Anointing him with oil in the
name of the Lord. You know what that is? It's asking
God to do the work through the Holy Spirit, through the oil
of gladness. If I sprinkled oil on you, you
know what it's going to do? Nothing. Nothing. Maybe keep you from getting a
sunburn if it's the right kind of oil. That's all. But the oil
of gladness, that's what you want to be anointed with. That's
what's going to save you who are sick, those who are weak
in the faith. And the prayer of faith shall
save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up. And if he's committed
sins, They'll be forgiving him. Who's going to raise him up?
The Lord is. Who's going to forgive him? The
Lord is. And that's the word. Judge not
that you be not judged. Ask God. And therefore, what
you'd have your brother do to you, do the same thing to your
brother. And God will save him, raise
him up, and forgive him of all his sins. Amen.