Disclaimer: Please be aware, these are just my thoughts and my points of view. I do not have the authority to judge anyone, to preach to anyone or to try and convince anyone of anything. If you are offended by Religion, Faith or God please do not read this blog. If you are not a Christian please read this with an open mind or do not read it at all. if this blog offends you in any way, please accept my apologies, it was not meant for you.
My Background
As I have probably mentioned in earlier blogs, I have grown up in an era where being intolerant was the norm… Catholics vs Protestants, Blacks vs Whites, oh and in Australia, we had Australians vs Wogs (Italians & Greeks), not to mention the hate on Gays and Lesbians… Then we move into the Rich vs the Poor, the Skinny vs the Fat and so on and so on…
I spent a lot of time listening to my Grandparents, Parents and people of their generation being intolerant of many things. This rubbed off onto my generation. And to be honest I probably said some horrible things as well.
Even within my church, there was judgement and intolerance. The town I grew up in had a very very strong English heritage and were intolerant of many things. If you were Catholic you looked down your nose at the Protestants and any other religion. If you were Protestant you hated the Catholics and any other ‘weird’ religion. Within each Church, there was also intolerance of Financial status etc.
The older I got the more I felt uncomfortable about all the intolerances. I believe that all people have good in them, that no one person is 100% evil. That everyone deserves to be loved. We are all sinners, we all have skeletons in our closet. It is not our responsibility or right to judge people, make comment on how they are living their lives.
I walked away from the Church for many reasons, but one of them was because of peoples intolerances. I couldn’t cope with people coming to Church, looking down their nose at other people in the Church, how they sat there pretending to be nice to them, knowing that the minute they walked out the church they would spend time judging them, talking about them, about either the way they dressed, the way they spoke, how much money they had, what status they had in the community, how smart their children were, what their children are achieving in life, who their children were mixing with, or how much they contributed to the church…
I have always believed in God, can give quite a few testimonials about how God has been in my life. My love for God had never changed, I have ‘talked’ to God my whole life, sometimes more than others. Many of my conversations with God have been around peoples intolerances. It sits so uncomfortable with me how we talk behind peoples backs, how we judge people, how we believe we are better than them.
I watch it in my family, in my friends, in acquaintances, in strangers, how conversations always turn towards how people are. They are judged on their religion, their skin colour, the amount of money in their bank, their job, their beliefs etc etc…. Over the years I have started to point out to people that we do not have the right to sit in judgement, that everyone deserves our love, how everyone is special…
Intolerances of Race/Skin Colour
No human being is inferior. It doesn’t matter what your skin colour is, God created us all and gave us our skin colour for reasons only he knows. What right do we have to judge someone because of their skin colour? Tell me, how is it Christian like or God-like to judge someone on their skin colour, we are all Gods children and he loves us all no matter what colour skin we have.
Intolerances of Sexuality
This is not where I am going to debate about homosexuality and Gods thoughts, this blog is about our (the human race) judgement of others. And I just have to say that it breaks my heart when I read/see/hear about people who say they are living for God and then turn around and are intolerant of the LBGTQ community. How can you say you love your children, love people and then disown them because they are gay? What right do you (we) have to judge someone’s sexuality? If we are living for God we love everyone and judge no one.
I am not saying that we have to be comfortable with homosexuality, I’m not saying we shouldn’t educate people on what the bible says about sexuality, what I am saying is that we do not have the right to sit in judgement of someone because of their sexuality. Well, because of anything, their skin colour, their religion, their financial status, their anything. It is not our job to judge.
It is God who will be the judge of our lives, it is God who we have to stand before while he judges us. It is not up to us to judge others.
Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God;
Intolerance of different Religions
What right do we have to be intolerant to people who are a different religion to us? There is bad in all religions, but there is also good… some of my best friends are Jehovah Witnesses and I have the most amazing conversations with them about God (Jehovah) and they have been a great influence on connecting me back to God. Although there are things that the Witnesses believe or ‘practice’ that I can not understand, I will never judge them or look down on them for their beliefs. But I do turn to them when I need help understanding some things within the bible.
I have some clients who are very strong Catholics, who have amazing testimonies on how the Holy Spirit has entered their lives. I have friends who are part of the Church of Christ and can tell you about how the Holy Spirit has been a part of their lives since they were children.
The Christian faith is in many Religions, but they all worship the one God. We do not have the right to judge anyone because of their religion…
Let’s look at Acts 10:44-48 NKJV
While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who heard the word. And those of the circumcision who believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out on the Gentiles also. For they heard them speak with tongues and magnify God. Then Peter answered, “Can anyone forbid water, that these should not be baptized who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?” And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord. Then they asked him to stay a few days.
And let’s also look at Acts 15:6-21 NKJV
Now the apostles and elders came together to consider this matter. And when there had been much dispute, Peter rose up and said to them: “Men and brethren, you know that a good while ago God chose among us, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. So God, who knows the heart, acknowledged them by giving them the Holy Spirit, just as He did to us, and made no distinction between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith. Now, therefore, why do you test God by putting a yoke on the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved in the same manner as they.” Then all the multitude kept silent and listened to Barnabas and Paul declaring how many miracles and wonders God had worked through them among the Gentiles. And after they had become silent, James answered, saying, “Men and brethren, listen to me: Simon has declared how God at the first visited the Gentiles to take out of them a people for His name. And with this the words of the prophets agree, just as it is written:
‘After this I will return And will rebuild the tabernacle of David, which has fallen down; I will rebuild its ruins, And I will set it up; So that the rest of mankind may seek the LORD, Even all the Gentiles who are called by My name, Says the LORD who does all these things.’
“Known to God from eternity are all His works. Therefore I judge that we should not trouble those from among the Gentiles who are turning to God, but that we write to them to abstain from things polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from things strangled, and from blood. For Moses has had throughout many generations those who preach him in every city, being read in the synagogues every Sabbath.”
Coming back to the Church
After many years fo not wanting to be part of a Church because of my uneasiness of peoples judgements, God reached out to me through one of my Jehovah friends and guided me back. After I received the message, I reached out to Pastor Jason and had a coffee with him… Over that coffee, I bared my soul about all the things I was going through at the time. He told me that he knew that I had a strong faith, but sometimes it was better to worship God as part of a community of worshipers, that it will help strengthen my faith and support me in my journey.
He asked me to make a 4-week commitment to coming to Church and after that 4 weeks decide if it was for me. My Jehovah Witness friends supported me in this and said that if for some reason I wasn’t comfortable at Pastor Jason’s Church they would welcome me to come and see if being a Witness would fit me better.
Before I could make a decision, there were lots of questions that I had and most of them were mainly around the Pastor’s Church’s treatment around people, what were their thoughts on different religions, what were their thoughts on different races, what were their thoughts on the LBGTQ community. Because I swear that if there was any type of intolerance towards any of this then I would not be going. And Pastor Jason turned around and said to me ‘it is not up to me or my church to judge anyone, it is our job to lead people to God. God will judge them when it is their time for judgement, it is up to them and God what the result of that judgement is.’ (or something similar to that).
So I thought long and hard about going to Pastor Jason’s Church… I had many conversations with God… the night before I went God spoke to me ‘If you do this you will be changing your life forever, are you ready to make that change?’ that was the message I got… I sat with that for a bit and at around 3 am I decided that, yes, I was ready to make that change. So at 11 am that morning I turned up and walked into the most amazing Church 🙂
Connecting all the dots
A few months after I started attending church regularly, I had a private bible lesson with Pastor and his wife Janie. I have had many of these sessions and I am forever grateful that both Pastor and Janie are very understanding, tolerant and loving people because I have lots of questions and they both give me all the time I need and answer all my questions 🙂
This one night though connected all the dots for me 🙂 I explained to me why deep down in my heart I knew it was wrong to judge people. This was definitely a light bulb moment… This is also one of my most favourite bible verses 🙂
But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. At dawn, he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now, what do you say?” They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him. But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let anyone of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground. At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” “No one, sir,” she said. “Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”
When Jason read this and we talked about it, everything just fell into place… let anyone of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her… that sentence said it all… we have no right to sit in judgement of anyone, we have no right to look down our nose at anyone, to believe we are better than anyone else because we are all sinners… and all sin is equal.
Other Verses
There are other verses that also talk about judgement that I would like to share with you…
My brethren, do not hold the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with partiality. For if there should come into your assembly a man with gold rings, in fine apparel, and there should also come in a poor man in filthy clothes, and you pay attention to the one wearing the fine clothes and say to him, “You sit here in a good place,” and say to the poor man, “You stand there,” or, “Sit here at my footstool,” have you not shown partiality among yourselves, and become judges with evil thoughts? Listen, my beloved brethren: Has God not chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him? But you have dishonoured the poor man. Do not the rich oppress you and drag you into the courts? Do they not blaspheme that noble name by which you are called?
If you really fulfil the royal law according to the Scripture, “You shall love your neighbour as yourself,” you do well; but if you show partiality, you commit sin, and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is guilty of all. For He who said, “Do not commit adultery,” also said, “Do not murder.” Now if you do not commit adultery, but you do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law. So speak and so do as those who will be judged by the law of liberty. For judgment is without mercy to the one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment.
Judgement and intolerances come in many forms – Bias – Prejudice – Stereotypical treatment… It is up to all of us to decide not to sit in judgement of others, to love all human beings and God creatures.
This blog is so close to my heart, but still, I feel like just by writing it I am sitting in judgement of people. So let me ask you something. How do not judge people?
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