Lamentations 3:40
Let us test and examine our ways,
and return to the LORD!
One of the great modern myths is the notion that absolutely all judgment of any kind is wrong. It is true that Jesus said, “Judge not” (Matthew 7:1). It is absurd falsehood to say that by this he meant any and all judgments of every kind were wrong. It is even more preposterous to say that he meant to teach us by these two words that everything is relative and that nobody could ever again say that a given thought or act was right or wrong. When Jesus warned against judging, he was warning against the act of usurping the authority to condemn and refuse forgiveness to another person. He was not declaring that everything was right and nothing wrong any more than he was declaring everything was right and nothing left. In fact, Jesus himself made many judgments and encouraged people to do the same (John 5:30; John 7:24). But he encouraged them not to condemn but to make “right judgments.” And the essence of a right judgment is in today’’ Scripture: That is, we must carefully test and examine our ways and then refer that judgment, not to ourselves as jury and hangman, but to the Lord, who judges justly and mercifully where we can only judge provisionally. Today, let us examine our own lives in the light of God’s abundant mercy and, as we receive his mercy, apply that just and merciful judgment to those in our lives.
