Sermon for Feb. 22, 2009: “Norms and Judging”
Scripture Lesson: Matthew 7:1-5
Every society has norms. A norm is “a principle of right action binding upon the members of a group and serving to guide, control, or regulate proper and acceptable behavior.” Norms are the regulations by which a group of people play the game of life, so to speak. In his teaching, in his way of living and his way of dying, Jesus sought to renew human society according to its own best possibilities. He sought to describe the norms by which humans could live together as the society of God – the kingdom of God. This is his work as the Christ.
Our work as Christ’s followers is simply to live by those norms, to live as members of the heavenly society, as citizens of the kingdom of God.
This society is not utopian, but it is blessed and good. It is not perfect, but it is positive and progressive. It is not finished, it is evolving. It is not arriving from somewhere else, it is emerging from within us. This society is not exclusive, it is not for some select few, it is inclusive and is God’s intention for all. It is not governed by a strictly enforced set of rules or laws, but it is guided along its way by certain principles of right acting and appropriate behavior, certain norms. These are the ways of humane, or wholesome human society.
All people are people of God, all are members of this wholesome human society, but not all know this, therefore all do not live accordingly. Some have come, as it were, to see the light. That is the light of life. The light of life has shone with unique brightness in a few great and godly souls. These are the wisdom teachers. Their teachings endure in the world’s great religions. Jesus is such a brightly shining light, and that is why we seek to follow in his path, to go in the way he illuminates.
I believe that in this way lies peace and joy. I believe that in this way lies the greater realization of my true humanity. I believe that in this way lies fulfillment and contentment. In this way is acceptance and love. These are the things that I seek. And these are the things that the Christ guides me, draws me toward.
So we come again to the central questions for those who seek to follow in the way Christ reveals – What does Jesus want me to do? What does Jesus want us to do? What must we do in order live as people of the light?
The answers to these questions are both personal, that is individual, and they are corporate, that is communal or societal. One must follow Christ for oneself, but we can only find our way together. We are individuals, but we are connected. We have a common life, of which we all partake. This is the symbol Holy Communion.
Our Bible passage for today is a record of one of the teachings of Jesus having to do with our life together. In it Jesus points us toward one of the great norms of wholesome human society – one of the great norms of the kingdom of God, to use traditional religious language.
Wholesome human society is non-judgmental. It is an environment of compassionate discernment, but not of judgment. “Do not judge, lest you be judged,” Jesus teaches. Let me explain what I think Jesus means by this.
What judgment is not = awareness of flaws in myself and others. Not critical discernment.
What judgment is = condemnation. A self-righteous and self-serving put-down of another, whether spoken and acted upon or harbored in my heart. Whenever one seeks to gain by making a condemning evaluation of another while remaining unreflective about oneself, that is judging.
When a group accepts judging as a societal norm, it becomes the rule by which all members of that society must play. All judges are ultimately judged and such a society will finally consume itself. Judgmental behavior is personally and societally self-destructive.
