Chapter 7a --
Jesus looks outward to the cosmos and to the sweep of human history before and after. He tells us we have no need to be anxious, for there is a divine life, the true home of the soul, that we can enter simply by placing our confidence in him: becoming his friend, and conspiring with him to subvert evil with good. He also shows us how we can be renewed in the depths of our soul, stepping ³beyond the goodness of the scribes and Pharisees² to become the kinds of persons who are genuinely at home in God¹s world.
Matt 7:1-12
We are out of step with God¹s life when we attempt to manage or control others by blaming and condemning them and when we try to force upon them our ³wonderful solutions² to their problems.
In contrast, Jesus shows us an effective way of caring for and helping the people we love asking‹which, naturally progresses into kingdom praying. It is a way that actually works, because it draws people into the kingdom rather than into the web of our devices and plans for them. It creates the community of prayerful love.
Be sure to take Jesus¹ words in this passage as a package. Don¹t take them as isolated points. They are the rationale and means for implementing verse 12, the ³golden rule.²
Also, recognize that this message is only credibly receivable in the context of the progression that we have previously walked through: laying aside anger and contempt, cultivation of lusting, verbal manipulation, payback and getting even, along with the burdens and anxieties of ³looking good² and securing ourselves through wealth.
Judge not
Condemnation, distilled, is our exercising a power of exclusion, of separation, of declaring the other person as an unacceptable discard of human life. The condemned one is seen as deserving of suffering, and not being worthy of protection and respect. Such has no part of God¹s love life.
The task of ³correcting² others is left to the spiritually mature, who know well their own weakness and feel the burden of the one needing correcting. (Gal 6:1)
Shame is a dimension of condemnation that reaches into the deepest levels of our souls. In shame we are self-condemned for being the person we are. It touches our identity and causes self-rejection.
But the gospel of the kingdom has such transforming power, it enables us really to become a different kind of person, beyond all condemnation, blame, and shame, and to know it. Those who mourn, when they step into the kingdom of the heavens, are ³given beauty in place of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of grief, and garments of praise in place of a sprit of despair² (Isaiah 61:3)
It is extremely rare that anyone who is condemned will respond by changing in the desired way.
Condemnation is the board in our eye. It blinds us to the reality of the other person. We will never know how to truly help our brother until we have grown into the kind of person who does not condemn. Period.
Distinguish ³judging² and ³discerning²
Condemnation is different than making clear assessments of fact and reality. There is a vital difference in the spirit of graciously speaking the truth with the intent of leading to life and the spirit of condemnation that always includes separation and presumption of deserved suffering.
When we enter the life of friendship with Jesus who is now at work in our universe, we stand in a new reality where condemnation is simply irrelevant. (Romans 8:1, 33-35)
Of Pearls and pigs
Dallas Willard tells us that the common use of this verse (7:6) is directly opposed to the spirit of Jesus and his teachings. It is taken to mean ³don¹t waste your time² on the unworthy ³pigs² or ³dogs². It is not worthiness that is in question here at all, but helpfulness. The point is not the waste of the ³pearl² but that the person given the pearl is not helped.
Pearl pushers pushing our favorite truth on those for whom they are not helpful.
Frankly, our ³pearls² often are offered with a certain superiority of bearing that keeps us from paying attention to those we are trying to help. We have solutions. That should be enough, shouldn¹t it? And very quickly some contempt, impatience, anger, and even condemnation slips into our offer.
What we are actually doing with our proper condemnations and our wonderful solutions, more often than not, is taking others out of their own responsibility and out of God¹s hands and trying to bring them under our control.
But, just as with ³swearing,² or making oaths, we are always to respect other people as spiritual beings who are responsible before God alone for the course they choose to take of their own free will.
God has paid an awful price to arrange for human self-determination. He obviously places great value on it. It is, after all, the only way he can get the kind of personal beings he desires for his eternal purposes. Just as we are not to try to manipulate others with impressive language of any kind (Matt. 5:37), we are not to harass them into rightness and goodness with our condemnings and our ³pearls² or holy things.
So have the practical good sense of the snake be watchful and observant until the time is right to act. And, be as undevious or innocent as doves without guile or intrigue‹being straight and honest. (Matt. 10:16)
As long as I am condemning my friends or relatives, or pushing my ³pearls² on them, I am their problem. But, once I back away, maintaining a sensitive and nonmanipulative presence, I am no longer their problem. As I listen, they do not have to protect themselves from me, and they begin to open up. I may begin to appear as a possible ally and resource. Because I am no longer trying to drive them, genuine communication, real sharing of hearts, becomes an attractive possibility.
Then, the dynamic of the request comes into play.
Asking
Asking is indeed the great law of the spiritual world through which things are accomplished in cooperation with God and yet in harmony with the freedom and worth of every individual.
A request by its very nature unites. A demand, by contrast, immediately separates. It is this peculiar ³atmosphere² of togetherness that characterizes the kingdom and is, indeed, what human beings were created to thrive in. In the very nature of the request, we acknowledge that the other person can say no, and, being guileless as doves, we accept that response.
So‹we come to the basic answer to the urgent need we all feel to influence others for good. That answer from Jesus is prayer, asking God.
Our confidence in God is the only thing that makes it possible to treat others as they should be treated. Because the power of asking and prayer is what it is, treat others as you would like to be treated. (7:12)
In many ways it is the life of prayer that discovers a space in which all can live.
Instead of harassing those near us with our judgments and treasures, we stand before them with our helpless requests, while simultaneously standing before the wise and mighty King with our requests for them.
In our inevitable finitude, there will always be incongruity between our dreams and aspirations on one hand and human realities on the other. Laughter is a natural human reaction to incongruity.
Genuine shared laughter is one of the surest ways for human beings to come together and break the stalemates of life. Laughter is consistent with an expectation of and realization of God breaking through in unexpected ways.