Assumptions and Presumptions

I hate it when people make assumptions about what I'm doing or why I'm doing it.

Given the life I live, which isn't quite what most Christian young women my age are doing, I've been given lectures and rebukes and disapproving looks plenty of times from well-meaning friends. It seems like most of the time when someone has actually said something, those were the times when I didn't need a rebuke! Those were the times that I actually felt confident that I was doing what God wanted me to or the times when I was doing exactly what I could and should to the best of my abilities. On the other hand, there have been plenty of times when a loving rebuke would have been quite appropriate and no one said anything!

I'll never forget the time when a friend rebuked me for something it looked like I had been doing. In actuality, what I was accused of had not even crossed my mind. I was shocked and hurt. What?! I was too embarrassed to even try to defend myself and explain what the situation really was. But it taught me a lesson to think not once, not twice, but several times before I decide to correct someone or presume upon their motives.

Well, I thought I had learned that lesson.

I recently found myself greatly humbled when I realized that I had presumed on a friend's very noble motives.

To me, it looked like this friend was motivated by a great deal of pride and selfishness in several major decisions that they had made. This wasn't one of those situations where one should just not form an opinion because one doesn't know the whole story. No, indeed - in this situation things looked very obvious. It appeared that such choices could have no other root than selfishness itself. This person even made several comments about why they were doing such things, and it confirmed what I had suspected.

I didn't spend a lot of time thinking about my friend's motives or worrying about their choices for life, but when someone else commented on what a sad choice this person had made, I agreed and added something about unselfishness being a virtue of which most people have much to learn.

And then I heard something from someone else. This friend was making these choices, not because they wanted to or would have chose such a course for themselves, but out of honor to parents who wanted something different. And they hadn't wanted anyone to criticize or dishonor their parents, so they had done the best they could to take responsibility for what they were doing and move forward, trying to enjoy what they were embarking upon.

I was speechless...

I hope I'll remember for a long, long time that even if it looks like I see the whole picture, I probably don't.

Esteeming others as better than myself means that I will be more likely to dismiss their shortcomings and errors and make excuses for what they do that I would my very own self!

Ummm... I have a long way to go!

How to Tell if You Are Correctly Judging Another's Actions

Sometimes it's nice to have a concrete check-list to evaluate my responses to others' actions. My post last night reminded me of this list, and I thought I would post it here for all of you.
Our family has had this list on our bathroom wall for nearly a year - ever since Pastor Courville preached a sermon with many of these points. I hope you will find it as helpful as I have.

If seeing someone else's failure...
~ Prompts you to review their past failures
~Makes you feel more comfortable with the failures in your own life
~Increases your estimation of yourself

If you see someone else fail and you...

~Are eager to tell others about it
~Have a desire to see that person punished

Your heart is WRONG!
If you are critical and proud, you will enjoy publicly exposing those who you condemn. This is what it means to be "judgmental."


If, when seeing someone else's failure...
~You don't form an opinion on first impression
~You remember that you could very easily fail in the same way (if you have not already)

If, at the sight of someone's failure...

~You intercede for him
~You are reluctant to share it with other people
~You desire that he will be shown mercy

Your heart is RIGHT!
When you truly love a person, you will want to deal as privately as possible with their wrongs. You will also want to see them restored and will be unwilling to just "sweep things under the rug" if the issues really need to be dealt with. You will realize that they may not want to be restored or think they need to be. That is why you must intercede for them.


Good and upright is the Lord: therefore will He teach sinners in the way. The meek will He guide in judgment: and the meek will He teach His way. All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth. Psalms 25:8-10

My Heart in Line with God's

I came across this quote in Matthew Henry's "Quest for Meekness and Quietness of Spirit" a week or two ago and scribbled it on a scrap of paper that's been floating around in my Bible as a bookmark ever since.

"When God's anger is kindled, ours must be stifled; the law of meekness is such that whatsoever pleases God must not displease us."

Every time I see that little scrap of paper, it convicts me of my weakness to just "be nice" about wrong things that others do. I am by nature, a very non-confrontational person and prefer to let people do things that I may not feel comfortable with, just because I don't want to "say anything." (I think I'm gradually getting a little better about standing up for right after nearly twenty-five years of hard lessons about what doing nothing yields.)

Of course, I know that many times it is appropriate to "put up" with the actions of others that I may not like or agree with. Most often, it is NOT my job to point out others' sins to them.

Perhaps some of my aversion to confronting others about sin (or even calling it distasteful and sin in my own mind) comes from the many times I have seen someone pick at the speck in their brother's eye, forgetting the beam in their own eye. There is almost nothing that I hate more than seeing one Christian doing that to another person, ignoring the totally hypocrisy in his/her own walk with God.

I continually remind myself, that my job is not to "straighten out the world"; my job is to rule my own heart and actions and keep them in line with God's heart. But in focusing on my own sins and ignoring those of others, I must not grow gradually comfortable with sin in other peoples' lives.

It is easy for me to grow calloused towards the ugliness of sin. Certainly, my attitude should be that of Jesus towards the woman caught in adultery - compassion and mercy - but in showing compassion, I must not loose sight of the horrific stench of the sin. I must not become soft towards little vices in other's lives, excusing things because it's them and not me doing it and "maybe they don't know any better."

Sin must always be exceedingly sinful in my eyes, if I want to have my heart in line with God's.

Because sin is what brought death upon all men. Because all sin is rebellion against the laws of a perfect, holy, and just God. Because sin is what nailed the sinless, loving Son of God to the Cross of Calvary. Because sin is what destroys lives, tears apart families, crumbles nations, and results in eternal damnation.

Sin is never only "sort of bad". Sin is never excusable. Sin is never okay in any body's life. And certainly, sin is never harmless.

God hates sin. He never made any excuses for it. People throughout Biblical accounts died for their sin - and rightly so - all of us deserve death for the great insults we have hurled at our Loving Creator with every breath that He gave to us in our vile and sinful state.

THIS is condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. John 3:19

Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us (!!), and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. I John 4:10

I must love people and intercede for them and show them mercy and grace - far more than I ever calculate any of them to deserve - but I must agree with God that sin is ugly and horrific beyond my comprehension. And I must seek to daily see things from His eternal viewpoint, not my warped, earthly eyes.