Luke The Orderly Account of Truth - Wash Your Hands Before You Clean - Luke 6:37-42

God, we thank you for this moment. We thank you for this chance

to open up your word and read your word to us. God, we

pray that we have open hearts to receive everything you have for us today.

God, that our minds are clear and able to receive your challenge today and

your encouragement through your word. God, you have a message, you have

something you're trying to get across in your word, and so we ask for

you to just open up our ears and hearts to be able to receive that

message you have for us today and give us the strength and courage to apply

it to our lives and walk out as the people you have called us to

be your Christians. So we thank you for this time. And Jesus name,

everybody said a men. We have been in a series going verse by

verse through the book of Luke, and it's called Luke The Orderly Account of

Truth. Luke the Orderly Account of Truth. And Luke has investigated and wrote

an orderly account of everything that happened when Jesus walked the earth, and he

did all this, and one of the benefit of him doing this is we

get to know the exact truth about who Jesus is and what he taught.

That's one of the most amazing things we get about all the gospel accounts,

but Luke straight up just tells us that's what he's doing. So it's a

helpful benefit that that's in there. We can know the exact truth about who

Jesus is and what he taught. And last week we talked about how we

will be known as children of the Most High by how we treat our enemies.

That how that's one of the ways we're going to be known that we

are children of the Most High by how we treat our enemies. It's our

actions. It's the actions that we do that show who it is that we

follow. Our actions show who we follow. And my question last week was

do people know who you follow? Do people know you will look and act

like the one you follow? So, how did it go praying for someone

you were in conflict last week? How to go? Did you feel your

affections growing for those people? Did you feel God like literally changing the direction

and I don't know, just changing the direction of your heart while you're praying.

It's interesting how he does that right, and he calls us to pray

for our enemies or even those who just consider us in enemy. Maybe we

don't consider them an enemy, they just consider us their enemy. So do

you, guys put some action behind the love? Did you actually bless them

in some way? Did you do something for him? Honesty? That's the

best. Thank you, Vanessa. Try it, even though it's not what

we're talking about specifically this week. Still try it. I'd recommend it.

Bless them in some way. Let's put some action behind that. But Luke

chapter six kind of shifting a little bit more into today. Luke. Chapter

six starts with Jesus preaching in front of a crowd by saying that we are

blessed when we're hated on account of him. Right, remember how he started

this sermon. As we got into chapter six, and we need to remember

that the Bible wasn't written with chapter markings and verse markings. It wasn't It

was on solid story, like a full letter or a full book. That's

how it was written. It was a continuous thought from the author who is

making a specific point. So when we are breaking it up each week and

we're taking a week break in between, it's helpful for us to go back

and actually look where we came from in the text. Bless you. That's

my bro. It's helpful to look back at where we came from in the

text right to help us get back on track, because there was no break

in between. We want to look at what the Bible said before, or

in this case, what Jesus said before. So that's what we're gonna do

right now, is we're gonna kind of rewind and take a little look back.

Because Jesus didn't take a break after saying love your enemies. He didn't

say, hey, love your enemies, I'll see you next week. That's

not what he did. He continued to talk about what he was talking about.

He said everything all at one time, in one continuous thought. So

Jesus, in this sermon that he started, he started it by saying that

we are blessed when people hate us on account of him. We are blessed

because that's how the people treated the true prophets back in the day, the

true prophets who spoke the word of God, and those old prophets definitely made

some enemies, right and when we gain these same types of enemies, Jesus

is telling us that we there's a specific way he would have us treat them.

We treat them the way the Lord treats the ungrateful and the wicked.

Remember what it was, He is kind and merciful. He's kind and merciful

to the ungrateful and the wicked, So we treat them the way we would

like to be treated, kindly and mercifully. That's the point that Jesus made

in verse thirty one. Let's look at it just as a refresher due to

others as you would have them do to you, plain, simple, straightforward,

And I think this was the main point that Jesus was landing on in

that particular section of the text. And now in today's text, Jesus is

going to continue to build on this same thought. He's going to continue to

build on the point he was making in verse thirty one. So I want

you guys to keep this in mind as we read through all the text for

today, because it's going to be very helpful for us to understand why Jesus

is saying saying the things he's saying when we remember this verse. Because context

matters, words mean things. It's not good to just take something out of

its place and say I'm going to decide what it means. Because this is

how I feel. No, it was in a place, It was in

a context, and the context helps define or helps us understand what it actually

means. The context matters. So today we're going to be in Luke chapter

six, verses thirty seven through forty two. So if you got your bibles,

you can start turning there. It's not too many verses, but they

say a ton. And if you don't have a Bible, we have them

on the back table there. You can grab one of those and keep it

okay, due to others as you would have them do to you. Guys

ready to read today's text, Let's do it. Do not judge and you

will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned.

Forgive and you will be forgiven. Give and it will be given to

you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over

will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it

will be measured to you. He also told them this parable. Can the

blind lead the blind? Will they not both fall into a pit. The

student is not above the teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be

like their teacher. 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 hypocrite. First take the plank out of your eye, and

then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye. It's

a lot in there, Not very many verses, but there's a lot in

there. If your car breaks down, who do you go to for help?

My dad? No mechanic? Right, you to a mechanic. If

you're in debt, who do you go to for advice? Like a financial

advisor? Yeah? Or someone who has zero debt? Right? If there's

something strange in your neighborhood, who are you gonna call? Everyone's like,

I know that one. That was a joke. Guys, But if your

car breaks down, you don't go to someone who has a beater car that's

barely working to get them to fix it, do you, No, we

wouldn't go to that person. If you're in debt, you don't go to

someone who's living paycheck to paycheck or who has massive amounts of debt. You

don't go to them for advice. No, the only one who can help

without causing more harm in these situations is someone who's dealt with the problem already,

someone who's already taken care of the problem. And I think that you

will see pretty clearly in the text today that we need to consider that for

ourselves as we address issues and problems in our brothers and sisters in Christ or

anyone. In fact, Jesus goes as far as to say that it's hypocritical

for us to think that we can even help at all if we haven't dealt

with a problem ourself, and when we try to help with an issue that

we haven't solved in ourselves. What I think it's like, and you might

disagree, but this is what I think it's like. I think it's like

a toddler who's trying to clean up right after a breakfast. Well, what

am I talking about? I'm gonna explain it. Have you ever seen a

toddler eat pancakes or waffles? You might as well close and all just throw

them in the bath after. There's no sense in trying to manage what's going

on. Right. Toddlers are like a sticky mess already, So when you

just pour syrup on the problem, it just makes all the more chaos.

Right, A toddler is no help to anything when their hands are covered in

syrup. All they will do is cause more harm. Right, They're going

to make more problems and more things for us to clean up. So what

needs to happen first is the toddler needs to wash their own hands before they

can help clean anything. Right, they need to wash their hands. That

what we are like when we are trying to address the sin in our brothers

and sisters lives without first addressing the sin in our own lives. We're like

a toddler with syrup all over our hands, trying to clean the kitchen or

clean the table. And that's why I call today's message wash your hands before

you clean. Simple as that, wash your hands before you clean. The

alternate title that I had for today was shackled hands can't free anyone, but

I thought that might have been a little too metal, So if you're a

metal head, use that alternate title because it means the same thing. But

I want to jump into this text, starting with the first two verses and

start looking at what Jesus is saying here. So let's go to verses thirty

seven and thirty eight. Do not judge and you will not be judged.

Do not condemn and you will not be condemned. Forgive and you will be

forgiven. Give and it will be given to you. A good measure,

pressed down, shaken together, and running over will be poured into your lap.

For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

And remember this is a continuation of the point that Jesus had made from before.

Do unto others as you would have them do unto you, Jesus says,

then says, so red effort, he's kind of making that point,

don't judge or condemn, but instead forgive and give. And then he says

something that I think is super duper important to the context of what we're talking

about today, and it's the measure that you use is the measure that will

be used on you. I think is helpful in us understanding and seeing how

this is tied to the point he was making in verse thirty one. So

let's address what is being said here, and then let's address what's not being

said here. And if there's one verse in the Bible that almost every non

believer knows. Can you go back one slide, Amanda, please, it's

verse thirty seven, right, Almost every non believer is like, do not

judge? Aren't Christians supposed to not judge anyone? Right? That's a verse

that they like to quote. Well, is that's true? Is that what

this verse is telling us? Is that what this passage is telling us?

And I think we need to consider two things when we're looking for the meaning

and interpretation of what scripture says and what it means. And we need to

look at what the rest of the Bible says about something. I mean,

this case, we're talking about judging, right, So let's look at what

the rest of the Bible says about judging others. And we need to consider

the context that it's in its immediate context to help us understand the meaning.

Because, like we said earlier, context matters. So what does the Bible

say about judging others? Well? I have two that I'm just gonna reference,

and then one we're gonna read. The first two is Leviticus nineteen tells

us to judge our neighbor fairly and to not pervert justice. That's in Leviticus

nineteen. Fast forward to Proverbs thirty one tells us to judge fairly and to

defend the rights of the poor. And the last example I want to use

today for this is First Corinthians six, and that's verses one through three.

If any of you has a dispute with another, do you dare to take

it before the ungodly for judgment instead of before the Lord's people? Or do

you not know that the Lord's people will judge the world? And if you

are to judge the world, are you not competent to judge trivial cases?

Do you not know that we will judge angels, how much more the things

of this life? So after reading those two references and then reading this right

here, I'll ask again, are Christians supposed to judge others? I mean,

it kind of seems like the answer is obvious. Yes, we are

supposed to judge others. Now, it doesn't say the word the ultimate judge

over others. We don't judge them based on their Salvafix stance. We don't

say if they're going to go to heaven or not. Jesus alone holds the

ultimate judge title, right, He's coming back to judge the living and the

dead. And that's what's going to happen when he returns. So when someone

says that famous phrase only God can judge me, you should look at them

and say, you're right, God will judge us all, and that should

concern you. That's not a comforting thing to say. God will return to

judge all. But when it comes to the things of life, we are

to judge between right and wrong. As believers based on scripture, we are

to judge between good and evil. What is sin, what is not sin?

People just don't like being told that what they're doing is wrong. So

then what is this verse and Luke talking about. Let's go back and read

it again Verse thirty seven and thirty eight. Do not judge, and you

will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned.

Forgive and you will be forgiven. Given it will be given to you

a good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running overly poured into

your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to

you. When you read this passage in its context of the verses that are

around it, and you read it in the context of other scripture, because

scripture interprets scripture we can see that this is talking about talking more specifically about

the way in which we judge. It's how we're judging that it's being addressed.

And the simple truth is, I mean, if you take the first

verse that if you never judge anyone, no one has a reason to judge

you. Right, if you don't condemn anybody, there's no real reason for

anyone to retaliate with condemnation. Right. That's just a simple truth. But

I think it's a deeper truth there, and it's that the measure of judgment

we use on others is the measure of judgment that will be used on us.

And if you look up the root word for judge that's actually used in

this verse, it talks about a type of judgment that is severe and unfair.

It's actually like somebody who's on the hunt and I'm always looking for where

you're feeling, so, oh, gotcha, Like that's the type of word

this is defined, the word judge that's used there. It's this person who's

like has zero mercy, it's just always on the hunt to judge. So

Jesus saying if you don't want to be judged severely like that, then don't

go around judging others harshly, much like what the Pharisees were doing and what

Jesus was correcting and rebuking the Pharisees, for they would judge others according to

their own standard that they had created, and they would judge them according to

that standard very severely, and they would take it a step further by putting

themselves in the position of being the ultimate judge, by saying, if you

don't hold to the standards that we've said, you are unrighteous. Therefore you

are not a follower of God or a child of God in that sense,

like you are in the wrong. They would put themselves in this ultimate judge

position, and this is the type This type of judgment goes hand in hand

with the next part of the verse about condemning. Can you go back one

slide, please, says, do not judge and you will not be judged.

Do not condemn and you will not be condemned. This kind of goes

hand in hand with the type of judgment they're talking about. And to condemn

is to pronoun some pronounce the judgment upon someone specifically as it relates to them

being guilty, to call them guilty. Who decides if someone is forgiven or

not. God does who has the power on earth of forgive sins. There's

a test, because we went over it in Luke, the son of mandas

he has the authority to forgive sins. Right, So God decides he's the

one who can decide if someone is truly condemned or not. Not us.

He says that those who don't believe in Jesus stand condemned already for not having

believed. So he says in John three, eighteen nineteen, somewhere around there

be a brillan back me up on that one. Check it out. But

we need to remember, right, we're talking about do unto others as you

would have them do unto you. So when it comes to us judging and

condemning the things of life, that we need to use the same measure on

others that we would like to be used on us. And we see in

this text that it is not just about the negative side of things or the

sin issues, but it's also the positive side of things. Right, Let's

keep reading the end of verse thirty sevens is forgiven, you will be forgiven

given, It will be given to you, A good measure pressed down,

shaken together and running over when we poured it to your lab for with the

measure you use, it will be measured to you. So it's not just

the negative side of things, it's actually the positive side that we should also

consider the measure we use for forgiveness and forgiving. And if we are,

if we are overbundantly generous with forgiveness and we're overbundantly generous with giving, then

we will experience an over abundance in return. The same way over abundance in

lack of mercy and judgment, you will receive over abundance of lack of mercy

of judgment on you. And we've already talked about going back to the generosity

side. We've already talked about this back in verse thirty from last week,

that Christians should be the most generous people on earth, the most generous given

people on earth. We've been given forgiveness and eternal life through Jesus. What

more do we need? What more do we need to feel to feel fulfilled?

What more do we need to be happy? What more do we need

to feel accepted? Does the Lord lack anything? Do we lack anything?

We've been given everything value wise, there's nothing that can top that we have

the savior of the world, that Christ died for us. But what about

forgiveness. I think it's the exact same thing. Christians should be the first

ones ready to forgive. We should be the ones. It doesn't it's you

don't have to convince me to forgive anybody. We should be the first ones

ready to just forgive anyone because we actually understand forgiveness. We know that we

are wicked and wretched without Jesus. We know that we're undeserving, and that

we are dead and our sins and trespasses. We know that we are desperately.

We were desperately and sick, and there was only one cure. The

cure for the sickness of our sin is faith in Jesus and what he accomplished

through his death on the cross and resurrection. Amen. Amen. And Jesus

has a lot to say about forgiveness all throughout the Bible, but I want

to hone in on one specific place, and that's in Matthew eighteen. And

this is will sound familiar, but it's the unmerciful servant. Then Peter came

to Jesus and asked, Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother

or sister who sins against me up to seven times seems pretty generous. Jesus

answered, I tell you not seven times, but seventy seven times, and

some translations say seventy times seven. Therefore, the Kingdom of Heaven is like

a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. As he began the

settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand bags of gold was brought to

him. Just to put things in perspective, that is an un insane amount

of money that he could never ever pay back Verse twenty five. Since he

was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife,

and his children, and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.

At this the servant fell on his knees before him. Be patient with

me, he begged, and I will pay back everything. The servant's master

took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go. But when

that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him

a hundred silver coins. It's a lot different than the debt he owed,

it's much less. He grabbed him and began to choke him. Pay back

what you owe me, he demanded. His fellow servant fell to his knees

and begged him be patient with me, and I will pay it back,

but he refused. In stead, he went off and had the man thrown

into prison until you could pay the debt. When the other servants saw what

had happened, they were outraged and went and went and told their master everything

that had happened. Then the master called the servant in you, wicked servant,

He said, I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me

to. Shouldn't you have had mercy on your fellow's servant just as I had

on you. In anger, his master handed him over to the jailers to

be tortured until he should pay back all that he owed. This is how

my father, excuse me, this is how my heavenly father will treat each

of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart. As Christians,

we should always be forgiving. We are not just generous with the things

we have, we're generous with our expression of forgiveness and our emotions tied to

them. How many times should we forgive? All of the times. That's

what that means, all of the times. If we don't forgive others,

then we don't forget. We don't understand forgiveness at all. We don't understand.

We've forgotten the mercy that Christ showed on us, that God showed on

us from our own sin. We've forgotten that mercy when He forgave us.

I mean, do we think that we're deserving of forgiveness in others? Aren't?

If we refuse to forgive somebody, what are we saying. We're saying

that I deserve forgiveness but you don't. That is not at all how this

works. None of us deserve it. That's the point of mercy and grace

that none of us deserve it, and He did it anyway. But the

reality is, and this is like what Matthew six says, that if we

don't forgive us, the Lord doesn't forgive us. It's because those who have

been forgiven will forgive others. It's a mark of a believer. It's a

mark of a believer. It's a work of the Holy Spirit in the life

of a Christian to forgive others. And think about Jesus. He forgave those

who nailed him to the cross, who whipped him and flogged him, beat

him beyond recognition, murdered him. So don't tell me someone did so much

that you can't forgive him, because Jesus went through all that and still chose

to forgive. But back to our text, and just to kind of wrap

up these two verses, here's the big point. I want us to remember

the measure of judgment, condemnation, forgiveness in giving you use will be used

on you. It's kind of just a way to summarize those two verses.

The measure of judgment, condemnation, forgiveness in giving you use will be used

on you. So, in light of Jesus' point from verse thirty one,

use the measure that you would like used on you. Do unto others as

you would have them do to you. Guys with me, awesome, Let's

keep moving. We're gonna go to verses thirty nine and forty. He also

told them this parable Can the blind lead the blind? Jesus would ask a

lot of rhetorical questions that the answer is like, well, no, dah,

can the blind lead the blind? Well, they not both fall into

a pit. The student is not above the teacher, but everyone who is

fully trained will be like their teacher. And last week we talked about the

fact that people will know who you follow by what you do, that you

will do the things that the one you followed us. Now Jesus is making

the same point. I think from the other perspective. He's changing the perspective

that the one you choose to follow is the one you will become like.

That's what he's saying, which means that we should be very, very careful

when deciding who we're going to follow. I want to turn to Hebrews thirteen

because I think there's some really big wisdom in this one verse. Remember your

leaders who spoke the word of God to you, consider the outcome of their

way of life, and imitate their faith. Remember your leaders who spoke the

word of God to you, consider the outcome of their way of life,

and imitate their faith. When we're looking to people to follow them, we

should consider the outcome of their life, the outcome of their way of life.

The assumption here being because it says who spoke the word of God to

you, is that you would look if there's a godly way of life,

that then you would imitate their faith. Excuse me, do they produce the

fruit of righteousness in their life, righteousness being in right standing with God,

the things that God would have us be, the things that God would have

us do. Do we see the fruit of righteousness in their life? How's

their marriage? What friends or company do they keep? What do others say

about them? And if someone's slandering them, are they slandering them for being

a follower of the Lord, Because that's actually a great thing to be hated

for. Right now, we won't ever find perfection because only Jesus is perfect.

Right, but we should still consider the outcome of those that we follow.

What is the outcome of their life? Consider that and then imitate their

faith. And I think it's like what Paul said in First Corinthians. He

said, follow my example as I follow the example of Christ. So if

you're choosing to follow somebody, who do they say they follow? And just

to take a little side note and park here for a second, you might

not officially identify this person's like I am following this person, But you are

influenced by all kinds of people and things in life. The world. The

world is loud, We're influenced, which is a type of leadership. Right,

So we have to be even more careful about who we allow to have

a voice, or who we allowed to influence our motives, our thoughts,

our decisions, our actions, all of that. Be very, very choosy

and selective about who you allow to speak to the deepest parts of your heart

and then influence those. Everything stems from there. We're going to talk about

it next week, So I'm not gonna preach Pastor Duncan's message for next week.

It's out of the heart that everything else comes. But back in verse,

back to the luketexs. Thirty nine and forty can the blindly the blind?

Will they not both fall into a pit? Student is not above the

teacher, but everyone who's fully trained will be like their teachers. I think

this is a huge slap in the face of the Pharisees, because who are

the teachers of the day, Who are the ones that everyone follows? It

was them who are the blind guides that Jesus was talking about. It's them

They had no idea, And we're gonna get into the plank part. They're

the ones who didn't even know the plank was in their eye. They are

the blind ones who still haven't removed that plank. So they cannot see clearly.

So Jesus is saying to everyone, not just the teachers, everybody,

don't be like that. Don't be like the blind leading the blind. You

will end up in a pit. So make sure you remember this. And

this is our second big point. Be careful who you choose to follow.

You will end up just like them. Be careful who you choose to follow.

You will end up just like them. That's not an overly spiritual truth.

That just is a basic fact of truth. You follow behind somebody,

you're going to end up in the same place they are going. Let's look

at the last two verses in today's text, Versus forty one and forty two.

I think this is the meat about what we're talking about today. 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 hypocrite. First

take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly.

To remove the speck from your brother's eye. How are you supposed to see

the speck that's in your brother's eye. If you have a plank in your

own eye, how are you supposed to see it, especially if you don't

even know you have the plank? Now, don't you to think about this

for a second. Imagine walking around with a physical two by four in your

eye. You see how absurd and weird that would look like, literally a

two by four sticking out of your eye. You could even turn to the

teeth like everything. You're gonna be smacking people everywhere you go. That's what

I think. That's the funny picture that Jesus is painting here. You're walking

around with a two by four in your eye. How absurd is it to

think that you could even get close enough to someone to see the speck in

their eye and carefully remove it. How could you do that? You have

an entire board in your eye. It's like someone like, I don't know,

your face is covered in mud and you walk up to someone, Hey,

you go to smudge in your face? Like, really, this is

what it looks like, this whole plank in your eye with a two by

four. That's what looks like when we try to address other sin without first

addressing our own sin. It's like a toddler with syrup on their hands,

just creating a bigger mess everywhere we go and on everything we touch, and

everyone from the outside can see it. It's not a secret. Everyone,

even the person you're trying to help. I think they're like you sure about

that? They can see it. Can you think of a more hypocritical thing

than telling someone what they're doing is wrong when you do the very same things.

I can't think of anything more hypocritical than that. It's like a person

who's drunk telling you it's a sin to get drunk. A drunk person walking

up to you. I think you've had too much. That doesn't make any

sense, right, You're like, how could you be more hypocritical? It's

time to cut you off, buddy. Yeah, could you imagine that?

And I think it's a simple but very specific example, But it's actually just

about all sin in general. This text, it's about all sin in general.

If you're ignoring the sin in your own life, yet you tell people

they should stop sinning, you are the definition of a hypocrite. And also

it being mean. I'm the definition of a hypocrite when I do that.

If I do not address the sin in my own life, and I walk

around and tell people they shouldn't sin. Congratulations, you're a hypocrite. That

is literally the definition. If we really want to help people with their sin,

which I believe we're supposed to, we need to be obedient to the

Lord, deal with our own sin. The sick can't help other sick people

get healthy, You will make them more sick. A blind person cannot lead

a blind person. They will fall in the pit. We have to get

healthy first. We have to be able to see clearly. So this is

the big idea in a sentence for you repent of your own sin before addressing

the sin of another, the sin of another. Repent of your own sin

before addressing the sin of another. We have a job to do, something

that we need to do. But let's bring this closer to home, or

I say, let's bring it to the living room. That's what I like

to say. What about when the person who has the speck in their eyes

someone that I'm in direct conflict with? Because so far what we've been talking

about doesn't seem like it's someone that I'm The sin issues aren't between the two

of us. It's about I just see a brother and sin kind of thing.

Think about how you're a approach would change if you address your own sin

first before addressing someone you're in conflict with. And I use specifically. I

use this text in Luke in marriage counseling all the time, and I like

it. It also challenges me every time I read it too. You can

ask my wife I'm doing any better at it. We'll see if I'm leveling

up or not. But you get to sit down with a husband and wife

who are in conflict about something, and it really doesn't matter what they're in

conflict about, could be anything, but both of them are sitting down and

all they're doing is pointing out how the other person has sinned against them,

all of the sin from their perspective or not perspective from their side, how

they've been sinned against right, you did this well, you did that well,

I only did that because you did this right. So it's pointing out

the sin in the other person and how they've sinned against you. These are

real issues that need to be addressed, So I'm not saying that they're not

issues that need to be addressed. They do need to be addressed. But

how hard is it to actually listen. When you are hurt by the sin

of another person in your own life, it's really hard to hear. It's

really hard to listen. You are deafened by pain. But what if?

What if before coming together, each person stopped, looked in the mirror and

asked the question, how have I been in sin in this situation? How

have I sinned against this person in this situation? I think very quickly we

will begin to see how our own sin has hurt our spouse or whoever the

other person is, How our own sin is added to the conflict, how

has it poured more fuel onto the fire and caused more destruction? And then,

after looking at the in the mirror, when you come together, the

first thing both people will do is you own all of your own sin.

You repent, and you ask for forgiveness. You don't get to address the

sin in the other person, not yet. Honestly, if you follow this,

the sin will be addressed by them, but you don't focus on addressing

their sin at all. You just come together and own everything you need to

own. Where did I screw this up? Where did I sin in this

situation? You repent and you ask for forgiveness. You first remove the plank

from your own eye and repent to your spouse, will humble you greatly.

It's not fun. Sometimes it's the eating crow. It's saying you're right,

I was wrong, and I'm sorry. And not only will it humble you,

but also increase the mercy you show your spouse or whoever you're fighting with.

Because you have seen how ugly your own sin is and how your own

sin added to this problem, you will extend so much more mercy. You

will realize is that you would like to be treated with mercy, because like,

ah, this is where I screwed it up. I'd really love some

mercy in this situation. Right, So what does that cause you to do?

You will do to others as you would have them do to you,

and you will extend more mercy. You see what's happening here. That's what

Jesus said. If you remove the plank from your eye, lets you see

clearly, so that you can remove the speck from your brother's eye. You

couldn't do it when there was a plank in your eye. You get rid

of it. You can now see from the right perspective. You see things

the way God sees them. It's not that person's wrong, it's what have

I done. Because I got my own sin I got to deal with,

then my perspective is right, so that if I ever had to address the

sin in my wife's life, or another friend or someone who sin against me,

then I will have the right perspective. I will show mercy when I

deal with that person. Removing the sin in our own lives gives us the

right heart, so we can help remove the sin in our brother's life.

And this is something that God would have us do for one another. He

actually tells us to, and that's in Galatians six. Let's look at those

first two verses. Brothers and sisters. If someone is caught in a sin,

you who live by the spirit, should restore that person gently, but

watch yourself, or you also may be tempted carry each other's burdens. And

in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. This word gently here

is huge, because you won't address their sin, you won't restore them the

right way gently. If you haven't first addressed your own sin, you will

approach it most likely like the Pharisees did. We restore that person gently,

but watch yourselves, or you also may be tempted carry each other's burdens,

and this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. Walking alongside our brothers

and sisters and helping them out of their sin is something that we should be

doing as believers. But Paul here is saying you need to watch yourself though,

remove that plank before you attempt to move the spec And the way I

kind of like think about this is if you struggle with alcoholism and that plank

is still until that plank is out of your eye of alcoholism, it's probably

not the wisest thing to go help your brothers out of sin at the bar.

We remove that plank from our eye, then we can go help our

brothers and sisters and sin at the bar or whatever. Can I have the

band come up, please? I wrote my notes. I said, today

might have felt like we bounced around, and maybe it's just because my brain

felt bounced around when I was going through this. So I was like,

it's time to re summarize in the middle of this. So what I want

to do is I want to go over just our big three points from today.

So the first big point from today is the measure of judgment condemnation forgiveness

and giving you use will be used on you. This is our first big

point. Use the same measure on others that you would like them to use

on you. Simple as that. Number two, be careful who you choose

to follow. You will end up just like them. To be careful,

to be intentional, to decide with scrutiny, who you will allow to lead

you and who you're gonna follow. If you follow the blind, you will

end up in a pit. Someone starts singing the pit, Andy Dwyer parks

and rec I ververend of the pit, consider the outcome of their life,

and then imitate their faith. And the third one repent of your own sin

before addressing the sin of another. Repent of your own sin before addressing the

sin of another. And I think this is the crux of what's being said

in the text today. And to repent just to kind of talk about that

word a little bit more, isn't just to apologize, Hey, I'm sorry

I did that. No, it's to turn away from right if you're walking

in this direction. Repent is literally to turn away from something and now change

directions. So for our sin, we repent to the Lord first. Then

we repent to the one we've sinned against, because the reason we repent to

the Lord versus against you and you alone, have I sinned? Right,

That's David's words and psalms. He understands that the first person we sinned against

anytime we did anything to one of his people, that he's created one of

his image bearers before we ever sinned against them. We sin against him first,

So we repent to the Lord, then we repent to those who we

have sinned against. So as kind of a little like single sentence summary for

this, I put a semi colon in there because it's a long sentence.

Before we help others with their sin, we need to address our own sin.

Otherwise we are like the blind leading another blind person. And don't forget

that the measure of judgment, condemnation, forgiveness, and giving you use with

others will be used on you. Makes sense. And the last thing that

I want to talk about today is the how how do we remove the plank

from our own eye? How do we remove the sin from our lives?

And we actually have two problems regarding the sin in our own lives, and

it's this Our sin needs to be dealt with eternally and daily. It's both.

It's not one or the other. Our sin needs to be dealt with

eternally, and daily sin isn't only an issue for us today, like I'm

trying to do the right thing today. That's great. We should try to

do the right thing today. But sin causes an eternal problem in us.

Our sin is what sets us on a path of eternal separation from God's peace,

a path to the presence of His wrath on our sin for all eternity.

But why are the consequences eternal. It's an eternal God we sinned against.

He is eternal. So the first way we need to remove the plank

from our eye is by believing in Jesus, so that through faith in Him,

our eternal problem is fixed. It's amazing. Faith in Jesus is how

our eternal sin problem is fixed. That all our sin, past, present,

and future are forgiven and we receive eternal life with Him hallely. Indeed,

that's the eternal side. The second part is the daily issue of our

sin that we need to fight daily to put our flesh to death. Every

day we're trying to remove and eradicate the sin from our lives. You're a

new creature, Why would you do the things the old creature did? Let

them die? And the reason I want to think about this or consider this

after talking about Jesus taking care of the eternal problem, is to make sure

that we that we remember something that's very, very important. We don't fight

against sin to be saved. We fight against sin because we are saved.

There's nothing you can do to save yourself at all. It is the free

gift from God that he would give us faith to believe. There is nothing

we can do, so we are never fighting to be saved. We are

never trying to stop sinning so that we are accepted by the Lord, or

to get into heaven. That's not what we're doing. Or if you believe

it as long as you're a good person, you'll get to heaven. That's

moralistic deism. Either way, what you've done is you've turned Christianity into a

religion based on works. And the problem with that it's not what God says.

That is not what God says, it's not what he teaches in his

Bible. It's by grace through faith that we are saved. You can't earn

it, you can't work for it. It's a free gift of God,

which should bring you not stress, should bring you comfort. It's from my

workaholics out there that are like, wait, I can't do something to receive

it. No, and I want you to take a deep breath and rest

in accepting the free gift of God, says the Bible tells us that's the

will of the Father, that all who look to the Sun and believe receive

eternal life. All who look to the Son and believe. Do you believe

in Jesus? Do you believe in who he is? What do you think

Luke's doing right now? He's giving us all the evidence telling us you can

believe. And here's the proof that you can believe. It's free. We

don't have to work for it. We don't have to white knuckle our weight

into heaven and pray that we do enough work that we get to stay there.

No, those who are in the Father's hands are safe and nothing can

take them out. Praise God for that. Our salvation is attained by belief

or faith alone in Christ alone. But we have to deal with our sin

both eternally and daily. It has to be both. And I'm going to

tell you why it has to be both. It doesn't matter how good you

are today or how much you try not to sin, if you don't have

faith in Jesus, you still pay the penalty for your eternal sin problem.

Right, So if you haven't put faith in Jesus and the eternal piece is

not handled, then what's the point of every day trying not to sin and

trying to fall the Lord. You still have a problem that's not solved.

And if you only put faith in Jesus and don't rid yourself of sin every

day. So say we got rid of the eternal problem, we put faith

in Jesus, but we don't fight to eradicate our lives from sin every single

day. Then what you're doing is you're cheapening the grace of Jesus and you're

proving that you don't actually believe what you say you believe, which means the

eternal problem actually isn't dealt with because faith without actions is dead red James,

check me on that one. Faith without actions is dead. Real belief causes

action. If you actually believe what Jesus said, you will fight to put

your sin to death daily. Real faith puts the desire to obey the Lord

in us. That's why we even have that desire to begin with. So

we will walk out our days fighting our flesh in order to be obedient to

God. Will we do that perfectly? I wish, I wish we could

do that perfectly, But no, I'm gonna lose patience and say something unloving

and unkind of my wife. I'm gonna, I don't know, like my

boys aren't gonna listen perfectly, and I'm gonna feel disrespected, and I'm gonna

be harsh in my leadership of my family. Whatever it is. Like,

I'm not gonna do it perfect, neither of you, none of us are.

But we are moving from degree to degree of glory more into the image

of Christ. Every day that we walk with Him, we are made more

christ Like, and He gives us the ability to do that. And this,

like, I want to leave us with a big encouragement. At least

I find it encouraging, so I think you'll probably find it encouraging. And

it's in the Book of Philippians. So we need to remember this as we

remove the plank from our eyes. And Philippians two. Therefore, my dear

friends, as you have always obeyed. This is Paul talking to the church

of Philippi, or the Christians in the City of Philippi, as you have

always obeyed, not only in my presence, but now much more in my

absence because He's not with them. Continue to work out your salvation with fear

and trembling, For it is God who works in you to will and to

act in order to fulfill his good pleasure or excuse me, his good purpose.

Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may become blameless and

pure children of God, without fault in a warped and crooked generation. Then

you will shine among them like stars in the sky as you hold firmly to

the Word of life. He goes on to continue to make another point,

but I want to stop right there. We work at our we work out

our salvation and fear and trembling. That means we take it seriously, and

we treat our relationship with the Lord with reverence. We revere that we revere

the Lord, knowing that it is because of our salvage. So because of

our salvation, because of our salvation, that God is working in us.

That should bring a comfort to you. If God's working in you, that's

comfort that you are his He is working in us to will and to act

to fulfill his good purpose. To will means to want to do something.

So if you have any mark in your life, you're like, man,

I just want to obey the Lord. I want to follow him. Guess

who's doing that. It's God working in you. And what about when we

actually pull it off and we're like, sweet, I did what the Lord

wanted? How did you do that? God working in you, his Holy

Spirit in you, gives you the will, It makes you will and act

you desire to and you actually pull it off. It's all Him working in

you to fulfill his good purpose. And it's in this process of the Holy

Spirit doing his work in us that we're made blameless and pure. That we

are we will be children without fault in this crooked generation. Is it a

crooked world out there right now? It's all kinds of backwards. God has

a very clear straight path and plan for humanity and the world does not like

that. But we will be blame, tameless, and pure, we children

without fault in this crooked generations. Then we a generation. Then we will

shine like the stars among people. That's amazing. Talked about it last week.

A city on a Hill cannot hide. You don't light a lamp and

then put it under a bowl. We're meant to shine. We're meant to

shine before others. And that's all. As we hold firmly to the word

of life is who is the word of life? I gave it away,

I said who It's Christ, Jesus. We cling to Jesus. That's how

all this happens. We put faith in Jesus. We remain in him.

This is why if someone told you, if you've been going to church a

while and someone said, come up to the altar, say this prayer and

you're good, and says nothing about remaining in Christ, they lied to you.

No, you can't just say a prayer and say now I can go

live my life however I want, because that's a mark of an I'm a

believer, to be in contradiction to what God's commands are. No, we

remain in Him. Just as much as a lamp that's plugged into an outlet,

you unplug it from the outlet, the lamp is useless. We have

to remain connected and remain in the Lord, remain in Jesus. So remove

the plank from your eye before you try to remove the speck from your brother's

eye. Consider and deal with your own sin before you ever try to address

the sin in someone else's life. Wash your hands before you clean. Amen.

Let's stand to our feet.