What God’s Holy People are For
Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, “Brother, let me take the speck out of your eye,” when you yourself fail to see the plank in your own eye? You hypocrites, first take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye Luke 6:41,42
This passage has two levels – the personal and the corporate.
Personally we can be judgemental of others, easily finding fault while blind to the same or similar weaknesses in ourselves. There was an old saying, “It’s the pot calling the kettle black.” In older, open, cooking fires both the pot and the kettle sat side by side and were both black with soot from the open flame. It was silly for one to think the other black when both were. So here. Too often the one criticising another has just the same weakness but can’t see them.
On a corporate level, Jesus’ audience would have immediately thought of the Pharisees. They criticised everyone else but were blind to their own failings. They wanted Israel to be a holier nation than the surrounding nations to be separate from them. But God wanted Israel to be a holy nation so they could be a light to the nations, reflecting His wisdom and majesty (Deuteronomy 4:5-8).
God wants a holy people but not so the church can judgmentally separate itself from the world, but so it can be a light to our darkened world, (Matthew 5:14,15) revealing a loving, caring, all-wise God (Matthew 5:16).
To listen to this message, download in MP3 here.