"Do not judge according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgment." John 7:24
Those who know me know that I pursue photography as a serious hobby. Awhile back, I posted a picture on my Facebook photo page of a seemingly poor young boy who was looking through a set of bars. When you post items on social media, you can expect commentary. In fact, it is often the purpose for doing so. In this case a young woman responded to the image. She implied that I was exploiting the child and suggested that I do something to help instead of taking pictures. What she did not know, nor care to ask, was that the image was captured during a mission trip to Haiti, that we were there on a medical mission to help people and not exploit them, and that the young boy was merely looking into a church courtyard from the outside and was not, himself, in any real distress or need. He was just curious.
This leads us to the context of today's Scripture. Jesus found himself being withstood by detractors who were using the fact that he healed an invalid man on the Sabbath day. To them, this was unforgivable and, in their minds, tore down his credibility to speak on matters of God and religion because what he had done was, in their minds, a violation of God's law. Jesus reminded them that they would circumcise a young boy on the Sabbath if the eighth day requirement happened to fall on that day and that they saw nothing wrong with it. The implication was that they would both be doing a work on the Sabbath and that the ritual caused pain. He countered that he was bringing healing on the Sabbath day and they wanted to kill him for it.
Beloved, we are so often quick with our opinions, particularly our negative ones. We formulate them with very little information, without stopping to ask questions or do research and often, with a great deal of emotion based on what we think, how we feel or how we may be affected. Further, we do so without examining ourselves. As Christians, we often take as a first principle that we are not to judge, particularly if we are the ones under scrutiny. I submit to you, however, that we are, in fact, required to judge situations and actions against the word of God, but must do so righteously and not in an effort to condemn based on our own thoughts and opinions.
I informed my photography critic of the circumstances and asked her if she was actually involved in helping anyone as missionaries do or just busying herself with misguidedly demeaning what others are doing. Jesus told his listeners to look and consider more deeply before rendering a verdict. Wise advice for us all.
Building God's family,
Lee
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