Daily Devotional
"Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?"
Matthew 7:3
In Respectable Sins, Jerry Bridges calls judgmentalism one of our most respectable sins because it is practiced under the guise of being zealous for what is right. That is what makes it so sneaky. We do not feel like we are sinning when we judge; we feel like we are defending the truth, like we are the only one in the room who actually cares about holiness. The sin wears a religious costume.
Bridges puts his finger on the engine of it: our trouble begins when we equate our opinions with truth. We take a preference, a background, or a comfort zone, baptize it, and turn it into a religious standard. Then we measure everyone else against it. Sometimes that standard comes from real pain, and we should be compassionate, but a wound does not make our preference into God’s law. Romans 14 confronts exactly this, where Paul addresses believers judging one another over food and special days.
Notice the absurd picture Jesus paints. The word translated log is the heavy timber that supports a floor or ceiling. A man with a beam jutting out of his own eye squints to remove a speck of sawdust from someone else. Everyone can see his log but him. Spiritual self-deception is exactly that blind.
Today's Challenge
Where have I taken something that is really my preference and turned it into the measuring stick of faithfulness for everyone around me? What is the log I have grown so used to that I no longer notice it?
Prayer
Father, expose the places where I have confused my opinion with Your truth. Show me the log I cannot see. I do not want a faith that wears a religious costume while my heart stays critical. Make me humble enough to be corrected. In Jesus' name, Amen.
