James 2:12-13 “Talk and act like a person expecting to be judged by the Rule that sets us free. For if you refuse to act kindly, you can hardly expect to be treated kindly. Kind mercy wins over harsh judgment every time.” Today's episode reminds us how important it is not to judge others. It reminds us that God will judge us in the same way we judge others. Really let that sink in for a minute. We will be judged as we judge others. Music:"Adding the Sun" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Kind Mercy Wins Over Harsh Judgement Every Time!
James 2:12-13 “Talk and act like a person expecting to be judged by the Rule that sets us free. For if you refuse to act kindly, you can hardly expect to be treated kindly. Kind mercy wins over harsh judgment every time.”
That was the message translation. When I first read this verse this morning, it was in the passion translation. This is what it says, “so we must both speak and act in every respect like those who are destined to be tried by the perfect law of liberty and remember, that judgment is merciless, for the one who judges others without mercy. So, by showing mercy, you take dominion over judgment.“ I like both of these translations. The reason I thought it was so important to share this verse with you today is because it’s so easy for us to judge. It’s so easy for us to look at someone else and think they’re doing everything wrong.
It’s easy for us to judge. It’s easy for us to look from the outside and see you so clearly that they should be doing this or that. It is perhaps most easy to judge our family as we think we know them very well. The thing I’ve discovered over the years is that we only know what people want us to know. I think the Lord has been really showing me this a lot lately. I’ve met so many people over the last year or two, and they look perfectly happy on the outside. They seem so close to the Lord, and it is clear that he loves them. Then, when I talk to them, I find out they feel so far from the Lord. I find out that even though they are beautiful and kind and loving, they’re insecure and feel ugly, unwanted, and not enough.
I know it is cliché to say you can’t judge a book by its cover, and yet the Lord keeps showing me over and over again this year that you don’t know anything about someone just by looking at them or examining their life from the outside. I think this is true even with our family. We think we know what’s best for them because we think we know them. We grew up with them. We were around them all the time, and we knew who they were. The thing I am finding out is that people are not always their true selves around family or around anyone. Sometimes, we act like who our family thinks we are. We act in a way we know they will approve of or a way we think we want us to act. I have discovered this can start at a really early age. I wonder what would happen if we stopped assuming we know what someone else is thinking. We stopped assuming we knew what they liked or who they were, and we started asking questions.
I wonder if we made it a point to be less judgmental if others would feel free to be themselves around us. I wonder what would happen if we stopped assuming intentions or motivations and just asked people what we were thinking. What if we stopped thinking we knew what was best for everyone? What if we trusted there was a reason they were doing what they were doing? What if we trusted God knew what he was doing with them and in them? What if instead of telling them all the reasons we think what they’re doing is wrong, we talk to God about it instead? No matter how much we want to and no matter how much we think we can. We cannot change people. The only one who can do that is God. So why do we waste so much time trying to convince someone to change? Wouldn’t that time be better spent talking to God about it?
Take a minute and think about where all your advice (a.k.a. Nagging) has gotten you. Has it changed the other person? Has it improved your relationship with that person? Has it damaged your relationship with that person? There are very few relationships that improve as a result of nagging. Even if the person finally changes, they may feel resentful of you for making them change, or they may try to change, but it doesn’t last long because they didn’t want the change.
Most of the time we don’t know the reason people do what they do. They might do something that makes no sense to us. For instance, we know someone, and they always push others away. We judge them, and we don’t understand why it seems like they ruin every relationship they find. However, if we could see inside them we would understand they have been hurt over and over again by loved ones. We would see all the important people in their lives have left them, and so now they always push others because they figure they will leave anyway, and they don’t want to get attached.
We might look at someone who has a lot and doesn’t share well with others. We may think they are greedy and selfish. Yet when we look at their childhood, we see they grew up without anything, and we’re taught that there is never enough in this world. They worry if they share what they have there won’t be enough for them. We might look at someone and judge that they are mean and cruel. However, if we could see inside, we would know the truly terrible things they endured over their lifetime. We would see that the world has shown them over and over again that there is nothing to be happy about. The world has shown them nothing but cruel people and that if you are nice to someone, they will just take advantage of you.
I like something different in both versions of this verse this morning. In the message translation, I really liked that it said, “Kind mercy wins over harsh judgment every time.” I wish we all knew this was true. Think about how much different this world would be if we just treated people with kind mercy instead of harsh judgment. Think about how much better people would feel if they were treated with mercy. It seems like the default these days is harsh judgment. At the Christmas dinner table yesterday, the kids were talking about. This guy named Luigi killed a billionaire healthcare executive. They said everyone is talking about this guy like he is Batman, or some kind of hero because he killed a billionaire. When did we decide that all billionaires are evil? When did it become OK to take judgment into our own hands?
In the Passion translation, I liked it when it said, “Remember, that judgment is merciless, for the one who judges others without mercy.” I really like this because it reminds us that we have a responsibility to show mercy if we expect God to show mercy on us. I think we can’t hear this enough. It is so easy for us to judge and not even think twice about it. This is a trick of the enemy. He knows exactly how God feels about judgment. He knows everything in the Bible. He knows that God will judge us as we judge others but the enemy doesn’t want us to know that. He wants us to think it’s no big deal. He helps us minimize the evil in our judgment because he doesn’t want us to go to heaven. He wants God to judge us harshly. Is that what you want? Think about how you judge others. Think about the things you say about them and the things you feel about them. Is that the way you want God to judge you? Are those the things you want God to feel and say about you?
I feel like this can’t be overstated because of the way the enemy is trying to hide it. We say it right in the Our Father Prayer, “forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.” The Lord will forgive us. As we forgive others. The Lord will judge us as we judge others. Maybe as we think about Jesus’s coming, which we just celebrated yesterday, and the upcoming year that we are about to enter, we can take a look at how we judge others and how we can offer mercy instead of judgment in this upcoming year.
Dear Heavenly Father, I ask you to bless all those listening to this podcast. Lord, help us to be more merciful and less judgmental. Help us to see how important this is to our eternal salvation. Help us to see others as you see others. Help us to see with your eyes, Lord. Give us a new eye sight. We love you Lord and we ask all of this in accordance with your will and in Jesus’s holy name. Amen!
Thank you so much for joining me on this journey to walk boldly with Jesus. I want to invite you to join mentoring for the month of January. The topic is identity and it is such an important topic. I hope you will join us. Remember, Jesus loves you, just as you are, and so do I! Have a blessed day.
Today’s Word from the Lord was received in June 2024 by a member of my Catholic Charismatic Prayer Group. If you have any questions about the prayer group, these words, or how to join us for a meeting, please email CatholicCharismaticPrayerGroup@gmail.com. Today’s Word from the Lord is, “Mark 10:16 “Then he embraced them and blessed them, placing his hands on them.” “I could almost see him with the children and the look on his eyes when he was blessing them.”