Reading:
 Matthew 7 v1-12

Main Themes: 
 Purpose Driven Life
 Building a church that is Warmer through Fellowship
 Learning not to judge others
 

Introduction

Having talked about the Christian's character, influence, righteousness, piety and ambition; Jesus now goes on to talk about our relationships.

v 1-5 To a brother/sister in whose eye we may discern a splinter: and whom we have a responsibility to help; not criticise
v 6 To a group startlingly called 'dogs' and 'pigs' They are people all right, but such is their animal nature that we are told not to share the gospel with them.
v 7-11 To our heavenly Father to whom we come in prayer, confident that he will give us nothing but "good things"
v12 To everyone in general: the 'golden rule' should guide our attitude and behaviour towards them.
(remember the "good works already prepared for you to do" Ephesians 2 v10)
v13-14 To our fellow pilgrims who walk with us along the Narrow Way
v15-20 To false prophets, whom we are to recognise and of whom we must beware
v20-27 To our Lord Jesus whose teaching we are committed to heed and obey

First remove the beam (v1-5)

Jesus does not anticipate the Christian community will be perfect. Rather He assumes there will be misbehaviour giving rise to tensions and problems in relationships. In particular how does the Christian respond to the misbehaviour in others? Two things are forbidden; one is commanded; and a 'more Christian way' recommended.

Christians here are not forbidden to ever go to court, nor are we to suspend our critical faculties, pretending not to notice faults. To do so would be hypocrisy - something Jesus roundly condemns elsewhere. To do so would also fly in the face of our God-given natural instincts. In fact how can "your righteousness exceeds that of the Pharisees" (Matthew 5 v20) if we do not operate our critical faculties! And Jesus speaks immediately afterwards of 'dogs' and 'pigs' who must be judged so by their behaviour.

What then is Jesus' command?

'Don't be censorious: rather be discerning'. To be censorious is 'to judge harshly', perhaps 'to set oneself up as judge' or 'be fault-finding' or to 'be putting the worst construction on someone's motives' - being ungenerous towards their mistakes.

In Romans 14 v4 Paul says "I do not [even] judge myself" - a probable reflection on Jesus' teaching here in verse 1. Again in 2 Corinthians 4 v4 Paul says strongly "it is the Lord who judges me … [even] … discerning the purposes of the heart" So to be censorious is to assume the role of Judge - God's prerogative, not ours. In fact if we do set ourselves up as Judge we call upon ourselves the greater judgement by presuming to know and discern the law - and hence less mercy when we break it. (Romans 2 v1, James 3 v1)

In summary, this is not a requirement to be blind: rather a plea to be generous. Don't cease to be human by suspending critical faculties - but use with care. Renounce the presumption and ambition to be God, in His role as Judge

A splinter and a beam

Earlier we considered hypocrisy in relation to God (6 v1, 5, 16) Now we consider a story telling us of the dangers of hypocrisy towards others.

We have this fatal tendency, which exaggerates the faults of others, whilst minimising our own. We seem to find it impossible to be objective in the matter, and quite possibly don't appreciate this story as a 'below the belt' kind of joke. On the contrary we seem to have a rosy-eyed view of ourselves in forgiving and forgetting and a jaundiced view of the faults of others. Actually what we are often seeing in others are the very same faults we suppress in ourselves - writ large in them and quite forgivable in ourselves. That way we experience the pleasure of self-righteousness without the pain of penitence. 
Moreover this kind of hypocrisy is all the more unpleasant because of the apparent act of kindness (removing the splinter) is made the means of inflating our own ego. "a cheap way of attaining moral superiority" comments A. B. Bruce. 
The parable of the Pharisee and Publican is Our Lord's commentary on this perversity; spoken out to "some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and despised others" (Luke 18 v9). What we should do is actually to apply a stricter judgement to ourselves. "If we judged ourselves truly we should not be judged" comments Paul in 1 Corinthians 11 v31. He could have completed the sentence saying: 'then we would be in a position to see clearly'.

Summary

Do not judge, or you too will be judged … first take the plank out of your own eye.

It seems impossible for us to objectively judge another;

Better by far to judge ourselves truly;

So that when required by Him we might "Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom." Colossians 3 v16