MARCH 17 The Jesus Questions

LIVING FOR JESUS --- Daily Devotional

March 17 / Day 18

365 Prayers to JESUS

Jesus, Praise Your Holy Name.You Lord have given up more than anyone will ever give up and You did it out of Pure Obedience to the Father. Praise be to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit for the Plan of Salvation. Let us not question why God chose Jesus as the Only Way to enter into Holy Fellowship with the Father, but let us instead be joyful and rejoice that God has prepared The Way for a sinner to be saved. Jesus is the Name and the Way to Everlasting Life with the Father and the Way to live more abundantly on this earth. Lord, I chose to live with You in heaven and pray to be always focused on the Way to get there. 

The Jesus Questions

JQ#4 - The 4th question we are going to answer is found in Matthew 7:1-6. Jesus does in this section the same thing He did in teaching us about “Worry” in JQ#3 by starting out with an imperative statement of Truth: “Judge not, that you be not judged.” (Matthew 7:1) Jesus is very clear on how He feels about us judging others, and it only takes Jesus 2 well placed words to say all that needs to be said about “Judging” in this verse as He states “Judge not…” and then He uses 5 more words — “…that you be not judged…” for a total of just 7 words to teach us all we need to pass a spiritual test on “Should we judge?” as Christians and then we could answer “Why?” we should refrain from “judging”. Jesus continues this important section in the next verse: “For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you.” (Matthew 7:2) I was hoping to get some feedback on this section, especially from Sharon Anderson who contributed so much “context” on JQ#1, because what may seem obvious on the surface may need to have the surface scratched a little for that “digging deeper study” on judgment of others by our worldly viewpoint.  Jesus does make it clear what our initial action should be when He asks JQ#4: “And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye?” (Matthew 7:3) Every time I read this section I get the impression that the Holy Spirit is telling me that if I observe something in someone else that makes me want to “judge them” then I should immediately run to a mirror and look to see what I am doing in my own life that generated that feeling? I always call this section “I surgery” or “me surgery” because I believe that we should operate on ourself to be acceptable in God’s eyes before I should operate on someone else so they are acceptable in mine. Jesus is telling us that there may indeed be a “speck” in my brother’s eye but if I try to take God’s place and pass judgment on the “speck” in my brother’s eye then I have effectively blinded myself by inserting a plank in my own eye from God’s perspective. Just as we cannot save someone from their sins because only Jesus has that power to save, it is our responsibility to share the Gospel of Jesus with them, I apply that to this “speck removal” operation, we are not to perform the operation of removal on our brother, but we should point them to Jesus and let the Great Physician do what only He can. This is a difficult question/subject so please provide some feedback and we will continue tomorrow on this section of “I surgery”.