Previous Post – The Cost of Community – FB Page

There has been a lot of talk about judgment on the blogosphere of late, especially with respect to the whole Rob Bell “universalism” charges.  I am not going to add directly to that topic, but wanted to share an excerpt from my forthcoming book “The Cost of Community: Jesus, St. Francis & Life in the Kingdom” (IVPress/Likewise Books, Nov. 2011).  Tell me what you think & how it might apply:

Jesus is clearly pointing out that, even as Christians, we will suffer the limitations of our sinful nature. Any righteousness that we have is not our by merit or effort, but reflected from Christ alone. We are as dependent on God’s grace as the brother with the “speck” in his eye. This sense of mutual sinfulness and common dependence on God must be the starting place of our relationship with others, both within the community of faith and in the wider world. This identification with the other, the humble recognition that we have not fully arrived at perfection, reveals that only One is qualified to cast judgment, and he chooses grace.

However, Jesus does not stop there. He isn’t saying, “You’re all pretty screwed up, so don’t point out each others weaknesses. Just deal with your own sin—in other words, mind your own business.” Rather, Jesus goes on to say, “first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye” (v. 5). Clearly Jesus does call us aid our brothers and sisters in removing the speck of sin from their eyes, but the posture has changed radically. First, only in seeing the sinfulness in ourselves, then working to overcome that hindrance, are we able to effectively see the challenges of others clearly enough to help them. Second, when we acknowledge and experience the painful and difficult process of having such sin addressed in ourselves, our hearts are shaped by the understanding and compassion necessary to do so appropriately with others. Few places exemplify this kind of mutuality and accountability like many twelve-step programs, such as Alcoholics Anonymous. The truest transformation comes when we share in the healing grace of God together in light of our common brokenness and mutual dependence.

In our culture of individualism, though, it is easy to read Jesus’ words as suggesting that we all must fix ourselves before helping others. This is impossible, as the analogy of the plank and speck demonstrates. After all, if we are to help our sister and brother remove the speck from their eye, it stands to reason that we are also dependent on our sisters and brothers to help remove the plank from our own eye. Therefore, the humble mutuality in serving one another in our shared brokenness is further established. This is where the discipline of confession emerges in all its difficult beauty. Stanley Hauerwas writes:

“The disciples are not to judge because any judgment that needs to be made has been made. For those who follow Jesus as if they can, on their own, determine what is good and what is evil is to betray the work of Christ. Therefore, the appropriate stance for the acknowledgment of evil is the confession of sin. We quite literally cannot see clearly unless we have been trained to see “the log that is in [our] eye.” But it is not possible for us to see what is in our eye because the eye cannot see itself. That is why we are able to see ourselves only through the vision made possible by Jesus—a vision made possible by our participation in a community of forgiveness that allows us to name our sins.” (”Matthew”, Grand Rapids: Brazos, 2006), p. 85.)

As we passionately seek to live out the radical ideals of what it means to be followers of Jesus, that very zeal can all too easily become a self-righteousness that leads to judging others. This admonition to remain humble and dependent on God and his people helps us resist that self-serving tendency. The beauty of God’s redemptive grace, however, transforms this very experience. Rather than it being a constant reminder of how horrible and sinful we are, which then keeps us too cowed to judge others, Jesus powerfully uses the very process of confession and repentance to help others discover the hope and liberty in his grace.

Tags: Books, Missional

This entry was posted on Monday, February 28th, 2011 at 4:08 pm and is filed under Books, Gospel, Missional. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.