The Sacred Obligation of Judging

Part I of a series

by A.W. Tozer

From his book “Reclaiming Christianity”

For he will finish the work, and cut it short in righteousness: because a short work will the Lord make upon the earth.

Romans 9: 28

Where is the remnant? Where can we find them? As soon as we bring this subject up, immediately all of the half-saved and the one percent saved – the backsliders, the borderline, the church members, the professors and those who have no witness of the Spirit to their redemption – begin to squirm and quote Scripture. And one Scripture they quote is, “Judge not, that ye be not judged” (Matthew 7:1).

They say, “That man is an old bigot, and he judges other people’s religion, and he judges me. What right has he to judge me? Does not the Bible say that love ‘thinketh no evil’ (1 Corinthians 13: 5)? And if that man had love, he would not think evil about anybody. He would accept everything done in the name of the Lord and would not say, ‘Only a remnant shall be saved.’ He would accept and believe in the good religious people that go and give of their pennies, and he would believe in them. But he’s not a loving man; he’s a severe, harsh man.”

I wonder if when Jesus said, “Judge not,” and when Paul said, “Love thinketh no evil,” and when Christ said that we should love one another and lay down our lives for each other, if that was intended to end inquiry and silence rebuke? I wonder if Jesus meant, when He said, “Judge not that ye be not judged,” that His prophets, His apostles and His preachers were not to go forth and speak truth to the church? I wonder if He meant that they were to go forth like the three monkeys on the whatnot shelf, “see no evil, think no evil, hear no evil,” and get the permanent smile on their faces that never will rub off until they die? I wonder if He meant they were to go forth believing in everything and everyone who says, “Lord, Lord,” and accept them into the kingdom of God? Did He mean forgetting that the same Holy Ghost who said, “Judge not,” through the lips of the Savior said a “remnant shall be saved,” a small fragment, a surviving trace?

Diagnostic Dilemma

Do you know what we need in the evangelical church now? We need diagnosis. Do you know what “diagnosis” is? It comes from two hard Greek words meaning to know all the way truth. That is what we need in the church of Jesus Christ.

Suppose somebody isn’t feeling up tp par and goes to see his doctor and says, “Doctor, I feel as if I have a mitten in my mouth when I get up in the morning, my head has bothered me and I don’t have energy and I just don’t feel good.”

And the doctor says, “All right, stick out your tongue.”

The patient looks at the doctor with a puzzled look and says, “What?”

“Put out your tongue.”

“I can’t understand why you should want me to put out my tongue.”

“Well I’ve got to know you all the way through; I’ve got to diagnose you, get to know you.”

And the patient says, “It’s an improper thing to do, and I beg your pardon.”

“Well,” the doctor continues, “how’s your appetite?”

“I don’t see why that’s any of your business.”

“Well, how do you sleep?”

“What difference is it to you how I sleep? I came for help; don’t you love me? I want you to help me, but don’t you love me?”

“Yes, but I want to know, do you sleep well at night?”

“None of your business, doctor. You’re a terrible man. Don’t you know the Scriptures say, ‘Love everybody, judge nobody, love thinketh no evil and love covers a multitude of faults’? And don’t you read the New Testament? Asking me how I sleep…none of your business.”

“Well, let me take a little bit of your blood.”

“My blood?!”

“Yes.”

“What do you want with my blood?”

“I want to know you through and through.”

“I came for help. I want encouragement and inspiration. I don’t want to give up my blood.”

“I can’t know you until I see your blood.”

“Oh, you are terrible, and you’re a radical bigot. Why should you want to know about my blood?”

“Well, let me at least take your blood pressure.”

“What do you want to know about my blood pressure? It is none of your business. Do you not realize that the Bible says, ‘Thou shalt not judge,’ and if you take my blood pressure, you’ll be judging me?”

A lack of diagnostic preaching

What kind of a crazy business would that be between doctor and patient? Satan would hold his belly and laugh in hell. Yet we demand that is the way the preacher is to feed the congregation.

I want to tell you something: We are beating the drum for revival and we are getting thousands of people to pray into the night for revival. But we might as well jump up and down on the altar of Baal, cut ourselves and cry, “Baal hear us, Baal hear us.” We will not submit to diagnosis. We will not let God find out what is wrong with us. We will not let God know us through and through, and we will not listen to the man who tries to find out and minister to our needs.

We go to the preacher for inspiration and encouragement and confirmation in our backslidden ways. As soon as he opens his mouth, even if he prays half the night for his congregation and would give his life for it, we shut him up by ramming this text into his mouth: “Don’t you dare judge anybody.”

This man says, “I’m a Christian, and you’ve got to accept it, otherwise you might be grieving the Holy Spirit.” And we shut up the mouth of the man who is trying to find out what is wrong and how we can be cured.

If this is true, that I am only to preach love, that I am only to tell you from the Book of Ephesians how wonderful you are, if that is true, then all the prophets who spake since the world began are all wrong. Beginning with Enoch, who said, “Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of the saints, to execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all the hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him” (Jude 1: 14 – 15).

To be continued…