Chapter Seventeen: Judgmentalism
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Judgmentalism
The sin of judgmentalism is one of the most subtle of our “respectable” sins because it is often practiced under the guise of being zealous for what is right. It’s obvious that within our conservative evangelical circles there are myriads of opinions on everything from theology to conduct to lifestyle and politics. Not only are there multiple opinions but we usually assume our opinion is correct. That’s where our trouble with judgmentalism begins. We equate our opinions with truth.
Of course, judgmentalism is not limited to conservative evangelicals. It permeates our society and occurs on either side of the cultural divide. The animal rights activists who burn medical research clinics and the extreme environmentalists who vandalize ski slopes are acting out their judgmentalism. The person who says, “Jesus wouldn’t drive an SUV,” is judgmental, not because Jesus would drive an SUV (that’s not the point) but because the person has made a dogmatic and judgmental statement based purely on personal opinion.
I grew up in the mid-twentieth century, when people dressed up to go to church. Men wore jackets and ties (usually suits and ties) and women wore dresses. Sometime in the 1970s, men began to show up at church wearing casual pants and open-collar shirts. Many women began to wear pants. For several years, I was judgmental toward them. Didn’t they have any reverence for God? Would they dress so casually if they were going to an audience with the president? That sounded pretty convincing to me.
Only I was wrong. There is nothing in the Bible that tells us what we ought to wear to church. And as for dressing up to meet the president, that’s a cultural thing centered in Washington, DC. If you were invited to meet the president while he is vacationing at his ranch, you would probably show up in blue jeans. Reverence for God, I finally concluded, is not a matter of dress; it’s a matter of the heart. Jesus said that true worshipers are those who worship the Father in spirit and truth (see John 4:23). Now, it’s true that casual dress may reflect a casual attitude toward God, but I cannot discern that. Therefore, I should avoid ascribing an attitude of irreverence based purely on a person’s dress.
I also grew up in the era of the grand old hymns sung to the accompaniment of piano and organ. It was majestic. To me, it was reverent worship of God. Today, in many churches, the grand old hymns have been replaced by contemporary music, and the piano and organ with guitars and drums. Again, I was judgmental. How could people worship God with those instruments? But the New Testament churches had neither pianos nor organs, yet they managed to worship God in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs (see Colossians 3:16). I still have a preference for church music sung as we did when I was younger, but it’s just that — a preference — not a Bible-based conviction. It’s true that a lot of contemporary music is shallow and human-centered. But there is much that is as God-honoring and worshipful as our traditional hymns. So let’s avoid being judgmental.
We have convictions that we elevate to biblical truth on a number of issues. I wrote somewhere that I had finally come to the conclusion that in most instances, the Bible teaches temperance not abstinence. I had to work through that issue also because again I found myself being judgmental when I would see Christians having a glass of wine at a restaurant. However, after I wrote what I did about temperance, I received a polite but firm letter from a dear lady who really took me to task. She was convinced I was selling out a foundation stone of Christian morals. I understand her concern, but she did not give me any evidence from Scripture. It was her personal conviction.
Please don’t get me wrong. I think because of the widespread abuse of alcohol in our society today there are some good reasons for practicing abstinence. And in another context I could make a strong argument for abstinence based on those concerns. But this chapter is about judgmentalism, and I’m just giving some first-person examples of how easy it is to become judgmental over issues the Bible does not address or address with the clarity we would like.
The apostle Paul faced this problem head-on in Romans 14. Apparently, there were two specific issues calculated to spawn judgmentalism in the church at Rome. One was vegetarianism versus an “eat whatever you want” mentality. The second issue was a matter of observing certain days as holy days. In Paul’s words, “One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike” (Romans 14:5).
Apparently, the people who ate only vegetables were judgmental toward those who ate anything (presumably meat), while those who ate anything despised — probably in the sense of being contemptuous — those who ate only vegetables (see verse 3). Both sides were judgmental toward the other. The vegetarians thought they had the moral high ground and so looked down their religious noses at those who ate anything. The other side thought they had superior knowledge. They knew that what they ate made no difference to God if it was received with thanksgiving (see 1 Timothy 4:4). So they were judgmental in a different way.
There are similar attitudes today. Contemporary music advocates may disdain those who prefer traditional music as simply old-fashioned and out of touch with the times. As one young pastor said to me, “With our music we’re going to get all the young people out of your church.” They can be as judgmental in a reverse sort of way as those who hold out for the traditional hymns. The same is true with the issue of temperance versus abstinence. I have known of instances where those who regard the use of alcohol as a matter of Christian liberty, are contemptuous toward those who practice abstinence.
My point here is that it doesn’t matter which side of an issue we are on. It is easy to become judgmental toward anyone whose opinions are different from ours. And then we hide our judgmentalism under the cloak of Christian convictions.
Paul’s response to the situation in Rome was, “Stop judging one another regardless of which position you take.” And then he added, “Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another. It is before his own master that he stands or falls. And he will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make Him stand” (Romans 14:4). Basically, Paul was saying, “Stop trying to play God toward your fellow believers in Christ. God is the Judge, not you.”
That’s what we’re doing when we judge others whose preferences and practices are different from ours. We are arrogating to ourselves a role God has reserved for Himself. Perhaps this is what Jesus had in mind in the well-known passage Matthew 7:1-5 when He said, “Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?” Could it be that the log in our own eye is the log of judgmentalism, arrogating to ourselves the role of God?
Here again we see Jesus using hyperbole to make His point. Physically, it is impossible to have a log in one’s eye. But just as the ten thousand talents in the parable of the unforgiving servant represents the true extent of our sin against God, so the log in one’s own eye may well represent God’s verdict on our sin of judgmentalism. If I’m correct, then the seriousness of the sin of judgmentalism is not so much that I judge my brother as that in so doing I assume the role of God.
What I’ve written to this point does not mean that we should never pass judgment on the practices and beliefs of others. When someone’s lifestyle or conduct is clearly out of line with the Scriptures, then we are right to say that the person is sinning. There are practices that are clearly condemned in Scripture. See, for example, the description of the moral slide into utter depravity that Paul describes in Romans 1:24-32. Or look at his description of the “works of the flesh” (see Galatians 5:19-21), or the characteristics of “the last days” (see 2 Timothy 3:1-5). These practices are clearly sinful. And when we judge them as such, we are simply agreeing with the Word of God. It is the Bible that is judging, not ourselves.
Having said that, though, we can still sin even when we judge in accordance with Scripture. We can sin if we judge from an attitude of self-righteousness or if we judge harshly or with a spirit of censoriousness. We sin if we condemn the obviously flagrant sins of others without at the same time acknowledging that we ourselves are still sinners before God. One of the major objectives of this book is to help us stop doing that.
DOCTRINAL JUDGMENTALISM
Another area where we can easily slip into the spirit of judgmentalism is that of doctrinal differences. For many evangelicals today this is a nonissue, because for them, doctrine is not important. I remember when I took a stand against open theism, the belief that God does not and cannot know the future. One friend said to me, “Why get so disturbed about this? Why can’t we just all love Jesus and get along with one another?”
Many of us, however, know that doctrine is important; and because we believe that is true, we can easily fall into the sin of judgmentalism. For example, the doctrine of Christ’s substitutionary atonement for our sins and the complementary doctrine of justification by faith in Christ alone are, to me, crucial doctrines. These are the kind of doctrines where I, so to speak, draw a line in the sand and say, “No compromise. None whatsoever, period!” However, some writers and teachers who consider themselves evangelicals are denying Christ’s substitutionary atonement. To them, Christ did not die in our place to pay for our sins. Instead, He went to the cross solely as an example for us to follow when we suffer. Others downplay the death of Christ on the cross, saying we should not focus on the cross of Christ but rather on His life, which we should follow as an example. Whenever the subject of my teaching or speaking warrants it, I take issue with these folks. And I think I am right in doing so. But I confess I have at times slipped into the sin of judgmentalism. I disagree so strongly with what they are teaching that I have sometimes demonized them. I don’t think I’m alone in this sin. I’ve observed it happening among others within our evangelical community. Because we do believe so strongly in the importance of sound doctrine, we can easily become hypercritical of those with whom we disagree. We should express our disagreements, but we should do so in a way that does not degenerate into character assassination.
A CRITICAL SPIRIT
Most of us can slip into the sin of judgmentalism from time to time. But there are those among us who practice it continually. These people have what I call a critical spirit. They look for and find fault with everyone and everything. Regardless of the topic of conversation — whether it’s a person, a church, an event, or anything — they end up speaking in a disparaging manner. I’m not writing about theoretical people. I’ve been with some of them, and they are not pleasant to be around.
In earlier chapters, I have mentioned that some of our acceptable sins, such as selfishness, impatience, and anger, are often expressed more freely at home among our family members than in public, especially the Christian public. This can also be true in this area of judgmentalism. Sometimes a spouse, either the husband or wife, can be a continual faultfinder toward the other or toward one or more of the children. The object of such continual criticism begins to think he or she can’t do anything right.
A friend of mine tells of being raised in an upper-middle-class Christian home where the father was hypercritical, especially of the middle child, a daughter. She gradually developed into a person who “could not do anything right” — at least one would think as much to hear her dad berate her. But the more he criticized her posture, the more she slumped. The more he pointed out her lack of eye contact, the more her eyes became fixed and down-gazed. If his repeatedly putting her down “for her own good” had one result, it was a type of self-fulfilling prophecy. She felt her father’s pattern of criticism as rejection, and she came to see herself as a reject. As an adult, her number one priority became to seek out those who would provide her with acceptance, and her “friends” soon learned how to take advantage of her need to be accepted. On his deathbed, the father realized his sinfulness and tearfully repented of his critical spirit toward his daughter. But it was too late. By then she had secretly become promiscuous and a crack cocaine addict.
This is an extreme example of the destructive nature of speaking from a critical and judgmental spirit. But there is plenty of evidence all around us of this sin’s sinfulness. It is often said that it takes seven compliments to undo the effects of one criticism. So let’s examine ourselves; or better yet, let’s subject ourselves to the examination of others. Do we have a critical spirit? Do we continually find fault with others, especially members of our own family or members of our own church?
Finally, I suspect that some of my dearest friends may disagree with some things I’ve said in this chapter. Some do not see the manner of dress in church or the type of music we sing as matters of preference. For them, it is a conviction. I respect their thinking and wouldn’t want to change their convictions at all.
I’d like to be like Paul, who took a similar position regarding the divisive issues in Rome. He did not try to change anyone’s convictions regarding what they ate or the special days they observed. Instead, he said, “Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind” (Romans 14:5). Such a statement makes many of us uncomfortable. We don’t like ambiguity in issues of Christian practice. It’s difficult for us to accept that one person’s opinion can be different from ours and both of us be accepted by God. But that is what Paul says in Romans 14. And if we will take Paul seriously and hold our convictions with humility, it will help us avoid the sin of judgmentalism.