RBWords

     On occasion, especially on retreats, when this passage from the Sermon on the Mount appears, I have looked around the retreat grounds for a large piece of wood to have the participants pass around from one person to another while I am preaching.  That piece of wood says more than I can!  Jesus is speaking to the all too common fault that we have in "judging" one another.  Perhaps the wooden beam in our own eye is shaped like a judge's gavel?

     I once saw a quotation from Native American wisdom that prays for the grace to walk a mile in the other's moccasins before judging him or her.  Maybe in our "judging" we reluctantly "make allowances."  This still leaves us in the position of being a judge.  We simply pass a lighter sentence!  Jesus calls our attention to the fact that we may not be seeing something about someone else if our eye is full of a larger piece of wood.  What we are seeing is our own problem.  How could we possibly distinguish a splinter some distance from ourselves in the midst of the huge amount of splinters right in front of us?

     The Sermon on the Mount continues to touch on those common but sensitive challenges that can serve as obstacles to our attaining the kingdom.  The very familiarity of the teaching as well as the problem may lead us to ignore the power of the challenge.  Perhaps if we remember that elsewhere in the gospel we are told that if we judge others, we too will be judged.  Will those judges have the same harshness or same leniency?  Do we want to take a chance on that?  Praying for the wisdom to remove the larger beam from our own eye can lead to the clarity of sight that will enable us to help others rather than judge them.  AMEN