“Therefore be merciful, even as your Father is also merciful.
Don’t judge, and you won’t be judged. Don’t condemn, and you won’t be condemned. Set free, and you will be set free.
“Give, and it will be given to you: good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over, will be given to you. For with the same measure you measure it will be measured back to you.”
He spoke a parable to them. “Can the blind guide the blind? Won’t they both fall into a pit? A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone when he is fully trained will be like his teacher. Why do you see the speck of chaff that is in your brother’s eye, but don’t consider the beam that is in your own eye? Or how can you tell your brother, ‘Brother, let me remove the speck of chaff that is in your eye,’ when you yourself don’t see the beam that is in your own eye? You hypocrite! First remove the beam from your own eye, and then you can see clearly to remove the speck of chaff that is in your brother’s eye.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv37, 38, 39, 41 He speaketh not here of civil judgments, and therefore…
He speaketh not here of civil judgments, and therefore by the word, forgive, is meant that good nature, which the Christians use in suffering and pardoning wrongs.
Brotherly reprehension must not proceed of curiosity, nor churlishness, nor malice, but they must be just, moderate, and loving.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv36–41 36 Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also…
36 Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful.
Ver. 36. {See Trapp on "Mat 5:48"}
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv37–41 See Poole on "Mat 7:1", See Poole on "Mat…
See Poole on "Mat 7:1", See Poole on "Mat 6:14", where we have discoursed what private judgings are here forbidden, and what forgiving is here required.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On vv37–41 This prohibition, Judge not, is not to be understood…
This prohibition, Judge not, is not to be understood of ourselves, but our neighbors. Self-judging is a great and necessary duty; rash judging of others is an heinous and grievous sin, which exposes to the righteous judgment of God. It is private judging and private condemning of persons which God forbids; it follows, forgive, and ye shall be forgiven. Not that a bare forgiving of others is all that God requires in order to your forgiveness, but it is one part of that obedience which we owe to God, without which it is in vain to expect forgiveness from God: Forgive and ye shall be forgiven. Mat 7:1
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On v37 All these sayings of Christ we had before in…
All these sayings of Christ we had before in Matthew; some of them in ch. 7, others in other places. They were sayings that Christ often used; they needed only to be mentioned, it was easy to apply them. Grotius thinks that we need not be critical here in seeking for the coherence: they are golden sentences, like Solomon's proverbs or parables. Let us observe here,
I. We ought to be very candid in our censures of others, because we need grains of allowance ourselves: "Therefore judge not others, because then you yourselves shall not be judged; therefore condemn not others, because then you yourselves shall not be condemned, Luk 6:37. Exercise towards others that charity which thinks no evil, which bears all things, believes and hopes all things; and then others will exercise that charity towards you. God will not judge and condemn you, men will not." They that are merciful to other people's names shall find others merciful to theirs.
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II. If we are of a giving and a forgiving spirit, we shall ourselves reap the benefit of it: Forgive and you shall be forgiven. If we forgive the injuries done to us by others, others will forgive our inadvertencies. If we forgive others' trespasses against us, God will forgive our trespasses against him. And he will be no less mindful of the liberal that devise liberal things (Luk 6:38): Give, and it shall be given to you. God, in his providence, will recompense it to you; it is lent to him, and he is not unrighteous to forget it (Heb 6:10), but he will pay it again. Men shall return it into your bosom; for God often makes use of men as instruments, not only of his avenging, but of his rewarding justice. If we in a right manner give to others when they need, God will incline the hearts of others to give to us when we need, and to give liberally, good measure pressed down and shaken together. They that sow plentifully shall reap plentifully. Whom God recompenses he recompenses abundantly.
III. We must expect to be dealt with ourselves as we deal with others: With the same measure that ye mete it shall be measured to you again. Those that deal hardly with others must acknowledge, as Adoni-bezek did (Jdg 1:7), that God is righteous, if others deal hardly with them, and they may expect to be paid in their own coin; but they that deal kindly with others have reason to hope that, when they have occasion, God will raise them up friends who will deal kindly with them. Though Providence does not always go by this rule, because the full and exact retributions are reserved for another world, yet, ordinarily, it observes a proportion sufficient to deter us from all acts of rigour and to encourage us in all acts of beneficence.
IV. Those who put themselves under the guidance of the ignorant and erroneous are likely to perish with them (Luk 6:39): Can the blind lead the blind? Can the Pharisees, who are blinded with pride, prejudice, and bigotry, lead the blind people into the right way? Shall not both fall together into the ditch? How can they expect any other? Those that are led by the common opinion, course, and custom, of this world, are themselves blind, and are led by the blind, and will perish with the world that sits in darkness. Those that ignorantly, and at a venture, follow the multitude to do evil, follow the blind in the broad way that leads the many to destruction.
V. Christ's followers cannot expect better treatment in the world than their Master had, Luk 6:40. Let them not promise themselves more honour or pleasure in the world than Christ had, nor aim at the worldly pomp and grandeur which he was never ambitious of, but always declined, nor affect that power in secular things which he would not assume; but every one that would show himself perfect, an established disciple, let him be as his Master - dead to the world, and every thing in it, as his Master is; let him live a life of labour and self-denial as his Master doth, and make himself a servant of all; let him stoop, and let him toil, and do all the good he can, and then he will be a complete disciple.
VI. Those who take upon them to rebuke and reform others are concerned to look to it that they be themselves blameless, and harmless, and without rebuke, Luk 6:41, Luk 6:42. 1. Those with a very ill grace censure the faults of others who are not aware of their own faults. It is very absurd for any to pretend to be so quick-sighted as to spy small faults in others, like a mote in the eye, when they are themselves so perfectly past feeling as not to perceive a beam in their own eye. 2. Those are altogether unfit to help to reform others whose reforming charity does not begin at home. How canst thou offer thy service to thy brother, to pull out the mote from his eye, which requires a good eye as well as a good hand, when thou thyself hast a beam in thine own eye, and makest no complaint of it? 3. Those therefore who would be serviceable to the souls of others must first make it appear that they are solicitous about their own souls. To help to pull the mote out of our brother's eye is a good work, but then we must qualify ourselves for it by beginning with ourselves; and our reforming our own lives may, by the influence of example, contribute to others reforming theirs.
VII. We may expect that men's words and actions will be according as they are, according as their hearts are, and according as their principles are.
1. The heart is the tree, and the words and actions are fruit according to the nature of the tree, Luk 6:43, Luk 6:44. If a man be really a good man, if he have a principle of grace in his heart, and the prevailing bent and bias of the soul be towards God and heaven, though perhaps he may not abound in fruit, though some of his fruits be blasted, and though he may be sometimes like a tree in winter, yet he does not bring forth corrupt fruit; though he may not do you all the good he should, yet he will not in any material instance do you hurt. If he cannot reform ill manners, he will not corrupt good manners. If the fruit that a man brings forth be corrupt, if a man's devotion tend to debauch the mind and conversation, if a man's conversation be vicious, if he be a drunkard or fornicator, if he be a swearer or liar, if he be in any instance unjust or unnatural, his fruit is corrupt, and you may be sure that he is not a good tree. On the other hand, a corrupt tree doth not bring forth good fruit, though it may bring forth green leaves; for of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a bramble do they gather grapes. You may, if you please, stick figs upon thorns, and hang a bunch of grapes upon a bramble, but they neither are, nor can be, the natural product of the trees; so neither can you expect any good conduct from those who have justly a bad character. If the fruit be good, you may conclude that the tree is so; if the conversation be holy, heavenly, and regular, though you cannot infallibly know the heart, yet you may charitably hope that it is upright with God; for every tree is known by its fruit. But the vile person will speak villany (Isa 32:6), and the experience of the moderns herein agrees with the proverb of the ancients, that wickedness proceedeth from the wicked, Sa1 24:13.
2. The heart is the treasure, and the words and actions are the expenses or produce from that treasure, Luk 6:45. This we had, Mat 12:34, Mat 12:35. The reigning love of God and Christ in the heart denominates a man a good man; and it is a good treasure a man may bring forth that which is good. But where the love of the world and the flesh reign there is an evil treasure in the heart, out of which an evil man is continually bringing forth that which is evil; and by what is brought forth you may know what is in the heart, as you may know what is in the vessel, water or wine, by what is drawn out from it, Joh 2:8. Of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks; what the mouth ordinarily speaks, speaks with relish and delight, generally agrees with what is innermost and uppermost in the heart: He that speaks of the earth is earthly, Joh 3:31. Not but that a good man may possibly drop a bad word, and a wicked man make use of a good word to serve a bad turn; but, for the most part, the heart is as the words are, vain or serious; it therefore concerns us to get our hearts filled, not only with good, but with abundance of it.
VIII. It is not enough to hear the sayings of Christ, but we must do them; not enough to profess relation to him, as his servants, but we must make conscience of obeying him.
1. It is putting an affront upon him to call him Lord, Lord, as if we were wholly at his command, and had devoted ourselves to his service, if we do not make conscience of conforming to his will and serving the interests of his kingdom. We do but mock Christ, as they that in scorn said, Hail, King of the Jews, if we call him ever so often Lord, Lord, and yet walk in the way of our own hearts and in the sight of our own eyes. Why do we call him Lord, Lord, in prayer (compare Mat 7:21, Mat 7:22), if we do not obey his commands? He that turns away his ear from hearing the law, his prayer shall be an abomination.
2. It is putting a cheat upon ourselves if we think that a bare profession of religion will save us, that hearing the sayings of Christ will bring us to heaven, without doing them. This he illustrates by a similitude (Luk 6:47-49), which shows,
(1.) That those only make sure work for their souls and eternity, and take the course that will stand them in stead in a trying time, who do not only come to Christ as his scholars, and hear his sayings but do them, who think, and speak, and act, in every thing according to the established rules of his holy religion. They are like a house built on a rock. These are they that take pains in religion, as they do, - that dig deep, that found their hope upon Christ, who is the Rock of ages (and other foundation can no man lay); these are they who provide for hereafter, who get ready for the worst, who lay up in store a good foundation for the time to come, for the eternity to come, Ti1 6:19. They who do thus do well for themselves; for, [1.] They shall keep their integrity, in times of temptation and persecution; when others fall from their own stedfastness, as the seed on the stony ground, they shall stand fast in the Lord. [2.] They shall keep their comfort, and peace, and hope, and joy, in the midst of the greatest distresses. The storms and streams of affliction shall not shock them, for their feet are set upon a rock, a rock higher than they. [3.] Their everlasting welfare is secured. In death and judgment they are safe. Obedient believers are kept by the power of Christ, through faith, unto salvation, and shall never perish.
(2.) That those who rest in a bare hearing of the sayings of Christ, and do not live up to them, are but preparing for a fatal disappointment: He that heareth and doeth not (that knows his duty, but lives in the neglect of it), he is like a man that built a house without a foundation. He pleases himself with hopes that he has no ground for, and his hopes will fail him when he most needs the comfort of them, and when he expects the crowning of them; when the stream beats vehemently upon his house, it is gone, the sand it is built upon is washed away, and immediately it falls, Such is the hope of the hypocrite, though he has gained, when God takes away his soul; it is as the spider's web, and the giving up of the ghost.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv36–42 Judge not, and ye shall not be judged,.... See…
Judge not, and ye shall not be judged,.... See Gill on Mat 7:1.
Condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned; censure not men's persons, and judge not their state, or adjudge them to condemnation, for every offence in practice, or because they differ in principle, lest you should be treated in like manner by others; and especially, lest you should fall under the righteous censure, judgment, and condemnation of God:
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forgive; offences and trespasses committed against you, bear with, and pass by injuries and affronts:
and ye shall be forgiven; of God; See Gill on Mat 6:14.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv37–41 Matt. vii, 1.
Matt. vii, 1.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv36–41 Verse 36. Be ye therefore merciful] Or, compassionate; οικτιρμινες,…
Verse 36. Be ye therefore merciful] Or, compassionate; οικτιρμινες, from οικτος, commiseration, which etymologists derive from εικω to give place, yield, because we readily concede those things which are necessary to them whom we commiserate. As God is ever disposed to give all necessary help and support to those who are miserable, so his followers, being influenced by the same spirit, are easy to be entreated, and are at all times ready to contribute to the uttermost of their power to relieve or remove the miseries of the distressed. A merciful or compassionate man easily forgets injuries; pardons them without being solicited; and does not permit repeated returns of ingratitude to deter him from doing good, even to the unthankful and the unholy. See Clarke on Mt 5:7.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv37, 39, 41 Luk 6:37-38. Judge not, &c. — See notes on…
Luk 6:37-38. Judge not, &c. — See notes on Mat 7:1-2; Mat 6:14-15. Give — Liberally to those that need your assistance; and it shall be given unto you — For your kindness and liberality will naturally gain you love and respect; and God also, by his supernatural grace, will influence men’s hearts in your favour. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over — “Our Lord makes use of these three phrases to express all the different kinds of good measure, according to the different nature of the things measured. Some of them, to make the measure good, must be pressed down and trodden; some of them must be shaken, as the several kinds of grain; and some of them must be running over, such as all sorts of liquors. The figure of giving this good measure into one’s bosom, is an allusion to the eastern habits, which were long pieces of cloth wrapped round their bodies, and girded up with a girdle. Their garments being of this kind, they could receive into their lap or bosom a considerable quantity of such dry goods as they sold by measure.” — Macknight. For with the same measure that ye mete it shall be measured, &c. — Amazing goodness! So we are permitted even to carve for ourselves! We ourselves are, as it were, to tell God, how much mercy he shall show us! And can we be content with less than the very largest measure? Give, then, to man, what thou designest to receive of God.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv37–38 What can be imagined more kind, what more merciful,…
What can be imagined more kind, what more merciful, than this conduct of our Sovereign Lord, that the sentence of the judge should be left in the hands of the person to judged? (Jansenius, Comment. in sanct. Evang.)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain On v39 Third Section: The Importunity of Love
Third Section: The Importunity of Love
(Luk_6:39-49)
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EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Luk_6:39. And He spake.—From transitions of this sort we see how loose the thread is which connects the different elements of the Sermon on the Mount in Luke. Respecting the understanding of the παραβολή, see Lange, on Matthew 13, and below on Luke 8. The here cited parabolic saying appears according to the more exact report of Matthew, Luk_10:24; Luk_15:14, to have been spoken on another occasion, and not to belong to the original Sermon on the Mount, although in and of itself it is quite possible that the Saviour frequently used such gnome-like dicta.
Can the blind.—If one is inclined to insist upon some connection between the four parables here following and what precedes, it would be best to settle it as follows: “The disciples might, after these words of the Lord, think in their hearts: It is not easy to be a Christian! They were called to show to the world by their preaching and by their walk the way which the Lord showed them: therefore this above all was needful, that they themselves should allow the light to penetrate themselves, and should establish themselves upon the right and only ground. To this now does the Lord admonish them.” (Besser.)
Τυφλός.—Whoever himself is blind for the light of truth cannot possibly serve another as leader, but draws him with him into destruction which reaches its fearful culmination in Gehenna. This was plainly manifest by the example of the Pharisees, comp. Mat_15:14, from which the disciples could see what leaders they should not be. Although all men by nature are spiritually blind, the judgment here pronounced is perfectly righteous, since the blindness of the leaders of the blind to the light of the Lord is a self-caused one.
Luk_6:40. Οὐκ ἔστιν μαθητής.—If the Sermon on the Mount in Luke consists in part of a collection of different sayings of the Saviour apart from their original historical connection, it is then indeed superfluous to inquire after the connection of the preceding saying with this. Yet Luk_6:40 may serve to illustrate the naturalness and justness of the judgment pronounced in Luk_6:39. In this way, namely: only if a disciple surpassed his master could he hope to be preserved from the ditch into which he sees his blind leader fall. Since, however, the disciple does not commonly surpass the master, he has also the same danger to fear. As a rule every one is constituted like his master.—We must not over-look the fact that here at the same time an indirect intimation is given to the Twelve to fashion themselves in all things after the character of their new Master.
Luk_6:41. And why beholdest thou.—Comp. Mat_7:3. Not merely “a climax upon the preceding” (Gerlach), but a pointing out of the way to be kept from the character and fate of the blind leader of the blind. Self-knowledge and amendment is required of the disciples of the Lord before they judge the failings of others and offer themselves to them as leaders.
Κάρφος.—“That He may warn us the more diligently He finds a palpable comparison and paints it before our eyes,—gives such a sentence as this, that every one who judges his neighbor has a great beam in his eye, while he who is judged has only a little splinter, so that he is ten times more worthy of judgment and condemnation even in this, that he condemns others.” (Luther.) As to the rest, moral defects, as well as those of knowledge, appear to be spoken of here, such as the Saviour relatively likens to a little splinter. The δοκός can then be nothing else than just that foolish imagination of a greater excellence compared with our faulty brother: therefore the man with the δοκός is immediately called ὑποκριτά because he demeans himself as if free of faults.
Διαβλέψεις.—The composite, perhaps chosen (“intenta acie spectabis.” Meyer) in order to place in a strong light the difficulty and delicacy of the work, in which the greatest carefulness is necessary. How surely every one has first to look to himself appears particularly from the following parable.
Luk_6:43. Οὐ γάρ.—First of all this parabolic saying is connected with what immediately precedes, “If thou dost not see the beam in thine own eye thou wouldst be like the corrupt tree, which cannot possibly bring forth good fruit.” So Bengel: qui sua trabe laborans alienam festucam petit est similis arbori malœ bonum fructum affectanti. Yet, since the Sermon on the Mount is hastening to its end, we may at the same time refer this word back to all the preceding requirements, the fulfilment of which is specially dependent on the condition of the heart.
A good tree.—Comp. Mat_7:15-20, and Lange on the passage. The fruits can here be nothing else than works. That the Saviour is here particularly thinking of misleading spirits in the Christian Church we do not believe, although we willingly concede that His saying may also be applied to these: as the sign of such it is not the walk, but the doctrine, that is given. In a striking way did the misleaders of the people who shortly after His appearance stirred up the unhappy Jews show the truth of this His utterance. They knew how with brilliant promises to allure great throngs to their side, but their behavior was so entirely in conflict with the essential principles of religion and of the state, that by this alone they could not but forfeit all confidence. The credulous multitude who gave credence to their words learned too late what evil fruits these trees of abundant promise brought forth.
Luk_6:45. The good man.—Comp. Mat_12:35. Probably no part of the original Sermon on the Mount, but communicated out of its historical connection by Luke. The Saviour regards no man as naturally good in the Pelagian sense of the word, but speaks of the sinner who has become good through grace. Both the good and the evil man He sets forth as they commonly reveal themselves outwardly, without however denying that even the good has his weak and the evil man his better side. The heart of the one and of the other is the magazine (θησαυρός), out of which perpetually proceeds what therein was in no small measure hidden.—For out of the abundance, comp. Psa_36:2.
Luk_6:46. And why call ye Me.—This same dictum is communicated in a complete form, Mat_7:21, with reference to the Pharisaic pretended holiness. Yet it is also applicable to the disciples of the Lord so far as in their disposition remnants of the old leaven are still found. It is only possible for the greatest misunderstanding, the most perverted apprehension of the οὐ πᾶς ὁ λέγ. in Matthew to find here a ground for declaring the external confession of the Saviour to be wholly indifferent. (Kant.) Comp. Mat_10:32-33. In the connection in which Luke reports this saying of the Saviour, it constitutes of itself the transition to the concluding parable, which he has in common with Matthew. Before any one comprehends the requirements of the ποιεῖνin an anti-evangelical sense, let him consider what the Saviour himself demands as the essence of the ἔργον τοῦ θεοῦ, Joh_6:29.
Luk_6:47. Πᾶς ὁ ἐρχόμενος, κ.τ.λ.—A commencement of the concluding parable peculiar to Luke, in a more lively form than in Matthew. The whole conclusion of the Sermon on the Mount shows sharply, from word to word, a striking climax. Very vivid is the representation of the man who not only begins to build but also incessantly digs deeper (ἐβάθυνε), and does not rest before he reaches the firm rock (ἐπὶ τὴν πέτραν). That this is done in Palestine even now by solid builders is stated by Robinson, Biblical Researches, vol. iii. The rock can here hardly be primarily the person of Christ, as in 1Co_10:4, but is primarily the word, wherein however He Himself is. Who builds thereupon the house of his hope builds secure; whoever out of Him seeks firmness and security proceeds towards certain destruction. The work of both builders becomes plain by the test. Comp. 1Co_3:11-15.
Luk_6:48. A flood.—De Wette: “an inundation.” Comp. Job_40:23, LXX.—Symbol of all possible tests which the edifice of faith and hope can have to undergo in hours of doubt, of temptation, and of danger of death. Then is true for the disciple of the Lord the word—Pro_12:7. The antithesis is so much the more striking as He does not here oppose the morally good to the morally bad, but simply the careful to the heedless.
For it was well built.—“For it was founded upon a rock.”—The steadfastness of the building does not lie in what is built, but in the foundation on which it is built.—Comp. Eze_13:11.
Luk_6:49. Without a foundation.—ἐπὶ τὴν ἄμμον, Matthew. All that is not πέτρα remains ἄμμος, even if it were outwardly like a rock.—The breach, in Matthew the fall, the one is consequence of the other. In both redactions the Sermon on the Mount ends as it were in a storm of wind, earthquake, and fire, 1Ki_19:11-12. The supposition that a rising tempest or rain hastened the end of the discourse and placed on the lips of the Saviour this last word is ingeniose magis quam vere. Now and then without doubt the Saviour has found occasion from the nature surrounding Him to the choice of His figurative language, e.g., Joh_3:8; Joh_15:1. But did He also in Mat_15:14, or in Joh_16:21?—Credat Judœus Apella.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. The four parables with which the Sermon on the Mount in Luke concludes contain the most admirable proofs of the Saviour’s wisdom as a Teacher. They were all taken from daily life, and also from historically given circumstances. One had not far to go to seek blind leaders of the blind, or to see beautifully appearing trees with evil fruit. So far as such manifestations continually repeat themselves in the church of the Lord, an eternal significance may be ascribed to them. The example of the Saviour moreover shows plainly how far those are from the ideal of Christian eloquence who condemn a great richness of noble imagery. Here there is no abstract development of ideas, but all alike pictorial and intuitive. The presentation of the subjects becomes plain in that these are made visible in persons acting very variously. Alternately we hear the voice of the deepest love, and that of the earnestness which menaces with judgment. The discourse unfolds itself regularly; is as rich in surprises as in gradual climax, and ends with an utterance which must leave the deepest impression in the conscience. “Non opus est, omnes homilias desinere in usum paracleticum,” remarks Bengel, with great truth, on Mat_7:29. After the reading of the Sermon on the Mount we repeat the declaration, Joh_7:46.
2. Without the word μετάνοια being mentioned, the last part of the Sermon on the Mount also contains a most obvious intimation of the indispensable necessity of the new birth. The blind who leads the blind into destruction; the hypocrite who overlooks his own faults compared with those of his brother; the corrupt tree which in its present condition cannot possibly bring forth good fruit; the fool who builds his house upon the sand—all give us to recognize in various forms the image of the natural man in his delusion and pride, in his ruinous fall and destruction. In vain is it to will to do good so long as one has not become good, and good can no one make himself without Christ. Comp. Jer_13:23. Thus does the Lord repeat here in a practical popular form essentially the same thoughts which He in John 3 has expressed before Nicodemus. On the other hand He states the one infallible sign of the genuineness of the great change which takes place in the heart of His true disciples: the joyful doing of His will.
3. When we observe how the Saviour in this part of the Sermon on the Mount also insists especially upon an active Christianity, it is almost incomprehensible how, in the course of the centuries, and even to-day, so much Antinomism could show itself in the Church. For, according to His intimations also, His disciple can and will be blessed alone ἐν τῇ ποιήσει αὐτοῦ. Comp. Jam_1:25. Never can the vindicator of a lax and shallow morality appeal to His words so long as He has not rent the Sermon on the Mount out of the Gospel. Yet, alas, to many an antinomistic theory is the profound saying of Gregory of Nazianzen applicable: πρᾶξις ἐπίβασις θεωρίας.
4. If we apply the saying: “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh,” to the Saviour Himself, how deep a look do we then obtain through the clear current of His preaching on the Mount into the golden recesses of his Divinely human heart! The less He says unequivocally in the Sermon on the Mount, who He is, the more clearly does it show itself.
5. Not unjustly has the conclusion been drawn from this part of the Sermon on the Mount, how much easier it is to take note of others than of ourselves; how much more convenient to show a brother the way than to walk therein ourselves; how great the danger of ourselves being found reprobates while we work for the salvation of others. Comp. 1Co_9:27. Perhaps it was similar considerations which in the end of the last century gave occasion to the singular question, “Whether it is a miracle when a clergyman is saved?” (Bretschneider, † 1792.)
6. The concluding parable of the Sermon on the Mount unites in itself allegory and prophecy in the most beautiful manner. In three verses there is here compressed the primeval, and yet ever fresh, history of all that which has been built, is building, and until the end of all days shall be built; on the one hand without, on the other hand in and upon, the word and the Spirit of the Lord. The μεγάλη πτῶσις of the house built upon the sand, was, among other instances, heard at the fall of unbelieving Judaism, as well as at that of all unbelieving philosophical systems which have overlived themselves, and at that of every state, of every church which is not built upon the only true foundation; and all this will repeat itself in continually greater measure, the nearer the last crisis of the future approaches, until the word is wholly fulfilled: 1Jn_2:17.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
He who allures to love, threatens also with the terrors of judgment.—The blind and his leader: 1. The way of both; 2. the fate of both, a. mournful, b. inevitable.—The disciple must be as his master, 1Jn_2:6.—Whoever will be to others not a mischief, but a blessing, must begin to know himself aright.—Unloving judgment a fruit of blindness in the judge.—Humility before God leads to love towards man.—A serviceable hand not seldom coupled with a loveless heart.—A brother’s name and a brother’s service without true brother’s love, an abomination before God.—Only the absolutely Holy One is able and entitled to judge completely.—A hypocritical judge of his brother a corrupt tree in the garden of God.—The connection between tree and fruit: 1. In the realm of nature; 2. in the realm of grace.—Christian diagnosis.—What is to be expected of men whose hearts are like thorns and brambles.—The heart a treasure-chamber for very different treasures.—A full heart and a closed mouth agree ill together.—The Christian cannot be silent concerning Jesus. Act_4:20.—First to become, than to be, last to do.—The spiritual vintage: 1. Here on earth; 2. in the future.—A fourfold relation to the Lord; there are men who 1. Neither say Lord! Lord! nor do His will; 2. say, indeed, Lord! Lord! but without doing His will; 3. do His will, indeed, but without saying Lord! Lord! (upright but anxious souls); 4. as well do His will, as also say Lord! Lord! The last, the concurrence of deed with word, is in every respect the best.—Nominal Christianity: 1. In its guise of great promise: 2. in its wretched reality.—The different builders: 1. One plan of building, but two manner of foundations; 2. one crucial test, but two manner of results.—How the genuineness of faith is tested: 1. In the tempest of doubt; 2. in the tempest of affliction; 3. in the tempest of death.—The magnificent Plan; the swelling Flood; the deep Fall; the heavy Ruin.
Starke:—In the choice of a leader, whether temporal or spiritual, all foresight and prudence is to be used; the danger is great, the mischief often irreparable, of hasty choice.—From the ignorance of pastors rises adulteration of the true service of God, superstitious sermons, abuses, and numerous disorders. 2Ti_3:13.—The least splinter can destroy the whole eye; slight seeming sins also are ruinous and damnable. Son_2:15; 2Sa_6:6-7.—Quesnel:—Whoever diligently proves himself, will not easily chastise others. Sir_23:2.—True self-knowledge the beginning of our own amendment, and the way to edify our neighbor.—The wisdom from above makes humble and compassionate, but earthly wisdom presumptuous and unmerciful men.—Self-complacence corrupts all good.—Osiander:—He is no pious man, out of whose mouth poisonous calumnies are heard. Psa_15:2-3.—Quesnel:—The fruits of a carnal or of a spiritual heart are the works of the flesh or of the Spirit. Gal_5:16 seq.—Bibl. Wirt.:—The evil heart of man becomes then good when Christ the fruitful olive tree is, by faith, planted in the same. Act_15:9.—He is only a mocker that calls God his Lord, yet obeys not His commandments. Mal_1:6.—To know and do the Lord’s will, manifests a faithful servant. Luk_12:47-48.—Osiander:—Believers are in all storms of temptation preserved to eternal life. Isa_32:2; Isa_33:16.—Ye teachers, ye hearers, ye parents, ye children, think on a right laying of foundations in religion, that in the hour of temptation and distress ye may not find yourselves deceived.
Heubner:—The disposition to give a verdict against others, the fruit of a false eagerness to quiet one’s self.—The Christian must be severe against himself, mild-judging towards others.—The culture of grace first fashions a man into something noble.—The inward disposition in man, what the sap is in a tree.—What a destruction shall come upon apostate teachers!—Couard (on Luk_6:46):—The confessing of Jesus Christ in Christendom. It comes to pass that 1. With many the confessing of Christ is wholly wanting (they deny the Lord); 2. with many this confession is the thoughtless language of custom (they are Christian in name); 3. with some only an assumed pretence of godliness (hypocrites); 4. with others a matter of the heart and expression of living faith (true Christians).—Jaspis:—Hypocrisy in religion: 1. How easily it creeps over us; 2. how quickly it grows; 3. how slowly it cures; 4. how deep it casts us down.—Hopfner:—Four things of principal concern in Christianity: 1. Faith makes the Christian; 2. the life shows the Christian; 3. suffering proves the Christian; 4. dying crowns the Christian.—Krummacher:—Who shall enter into the kingdom of heaven? (on Luk_6:46. Comp. Mat_7:21-23.) From this saying appears the threefold necessity: 1. Of saying “Lord! Lord!” 2. of the new birth through the Holy Spirit; 3. of incorporation into the despised ecclesiola in ecclesia.—Claus Harms (on the Pericope Mat_7:15-22):—Deeper Christian truths in the text read. They respect: 1. The teachers, especially the false; 2. the conditions of our salvation, the rule and the exception; 3. the future decision, when and by whom, and according to what it is made.
“Let not him who is established and built upon the rock, imagine that he can now be no more overtaken by all manner of affliction or danger. Rather is he like a house that is situated on the shore of the sea, upon which the waves beat heavier than is known to houses inland. This house must be the target and mark of all the beating storms of the world. But because it is founded on the rock, it may indeed be shaken to the centre, and its rafters creak, yet fall shall it never, for its foundation stands fast and unmovable.” Chemnitz.
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv37, 39, 40, 41 See on Mat 7:1-2; but this is much fuller…
See on Mat 7:1-2; but this is much fuller and more graphic.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv39–40 39. Parable—Mat_15:14. This passage, like many others, our Lord…
39. Parable—Mat_15:14. This passage, like many others, our Lord may be supposed to have uttered on more than one occasion. It seems in the sermon on the mount to have come in after Mat_7:20.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv36–42 36. Be ye therefore merciful] Rather, Become, or Prove…
36. Be ye therefore merciful] Rather, Become, or Prove yourselves merciful (omit οὖν, אBDL).
merciful] St Matthew has “perfect,” Mat_5:48; but that there is no essential difference between the two Evangelists we may see in such expressions as “the Father of Mercies,” 2Co_1:3; “The Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy,” Jas_5:11; “Put on therefore as the elect of God...bowels of mercies, kindness,” Col_3:12; Isa_30:18. “God can only be our ideal in His moral attributes, of which Love is the centre.” Van Oosterzee.
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“It is an attribute to God Himself,
And earthly power doth then shew likest God’s
When mercy seasons justice.”
Shakespeare.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv36–41 (36) Be ye therefore merciful.—The form of the sentence…
(36) Be ye therefore merciful.—The form of the sentence is the same as that of Mat_5:48, but “merciful” takes the place of “perfect,” as being the noblest of the divine attributes, in which all others reach their completeness. The well-known passage in Shakespeare on the “quality of mercy,” is, perhaps, the best comment on this verse (Merchant of Venice, iv. 1).
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv36–41 Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is…
Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful. "Yes," goes on the Master, "be ye kind, tender-hearted, merciful; stop not short at the easier love, but go on to the harder; and do this because God does it even to the unthankful and evil" (ver. 35). On this attribute of the mercy of the Most High, James, who had evidently drunk deep of the wisdom contained in this great discourse of his so-called brother, speaks of the Lord as "very pitiful, and of tender mercy". (Jam_5:11)
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv36–41 Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is…
Luk_6:36
Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful
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The blessing of mercy
Mercy is the one great cry of human nature.
We dare not ask for justice, we can only plead for mercy. We, who want so much mercy from God, must learn to show mercy to our fellow-men. How can we look to Him for mercy if we never show mercy, how can we ask forgiveness unless we forgive? Think of some of the ways in which we can show mercy.
1. We must show mercy and loving-kindness, practically, by deeds, not words.
2. We can show mercy by for giving those who injure us. Few things are more talked of, and less practised, than the duty of forgiveness.
3. Mercy ever brings its sweet reward. Every act of loving-kindness comes back to us with abundant interest. Once a farmer, out on the western prairies of America, started for a distant town, to receive some money due to him. As he left his house, his only child, a little girl, clung lovingly to him, and reminded him of his promise to bring her home a present. Late on the same night the farmer left the town on his way home. The night was very dark and stormy, and he was yet far from his home, and in the wildest part of the road, when he heard the cry of a child. The farmer thought that it might be the device of some robber, as he was known to carry money with him. He was weary and wet with his journey, and inclined to hasten on, but again the cry reached him. The farmer determined that whatever happened he must search for the child, if child there were. Groping in the darkness, at last he found a little figure, drenched with rain, and shivering with cold. Wrapping his cloak about the child, he rode homewards as fast as possible, but when he reached his house, he found it full of neighbours, standing round his weeping wife. One said to another, Do not tell him, it will drive him mad. Then the farmer set down his bundle, and his wife with a cry of joy saw that it was their own lost child. The little one had set forth to meet her father, and had missed her way. The man had, without knowing it, saved his own daughter. (H. J. Wilmot-Buxton, M. A.)
Imitation of the mercy of God
What can be a more endearing motive to the mind of man, than to propose to him a resemblance to the most high God; to urge the conduct of the Father of the universe, as an example for his imitation.
1. The first excellence in the mercy of God which will naturally occur to our thoughts, as deserving our imitation, is its entire disinterestedness and perfect liberality. Our goodness, therefore, must be void of selfish and earthly motives.
2. Its universality. We must endeavour to do all the good we can to all around us, neither slighting the ignorant, nor despising the mean and indigent, nor abandoning the vicious and unworthy in their distress.
(1) Although our mercy may and ought to be universal in will and intention, yet, in consequence of our little power, it must be very limited in reality and in effect (2Co_8:12).
(2) This example of the unconfined extent of the Divine mercy does not hinder us from having a more particular regard to certain persons, and peculiar situations of distress (Gal_6:10).
3. Its unwearied perseverance. Let us, like God, be not weary in well-doing.
4. Its long-suffering patience.
5. Its readiness and willingness to forgive. (James Biddoch, M. A.)
Practical manifestations of mercy
In how many thousand instances does a man hold in his own hands the power of manifesting this blessed quality of mercy! You are an employer; there is some boy in your employment who commits his first transgression, perhaps not really conscious of the evil that he does. Perhaps in an unguarded moment he takes from you something that belongs to you. You do not injure society by exercising mercy towards that boy. How often is it the case that your judicious act of mercy, tempered by justice, has been the means of saving that boy from open exposure, from public punishment; how often it is the salvation of that boy! Do you suppose that it is justice in that case that the penalty of the law shall brand him--that he shall be marked as a criminal, that he shall be self-degraded? This is an instance which men of business will tell me often occurs, and can there be any doubt as to what justice is in that case? So I say, when a mans reputation lies at our mercy, we are bound to make all the allowance we can for his action. If he does a foolish thing, let us be disposed, as far as possible, to make allowance, to think what may have been the peculiar circumstances under which he did it. We are all called upon to exercise this prerogative of mercy, and that in innumerable forms. (E. H. Chapin, D. D.)
Gospel for the fourth Sunday after Trinity
I. WE ARE INCITED TO IMITATION-OF OUR HEAVENLY FATHER. We are His children, and children ought to resemble their parents (Eph_5:1, R.V.)
II. AN APPEAL IS MADE TO OUR SELF-INTEREST. It is a principle of the Divine administration that the standard you apply to others shall be applied to you.
III. OUR LORD SUGGESTS THE WAY IN WHICH WE MAY HOPE TO PASS RIGHTEOUS JUDGMENTS UPON OTHERS. By being first jealous and severe judges of ourselves. (Homiletic Quarterly.)
Man a child of mercy
When God, in His eternal counsel, conceived the thought of mans creation, He called to Him the three ministers who wait constantly upon His throne--Justice, Truth, and Mercy--and thus addressed them: Shall we make man? Then said Justice, O God! make him not: for he will trample upon Thy laws. Truth made answer also, O God! make him not, for he will pollute Thy sanctuaries. But Mercy, dropping upon her knees, and looking up through her tears, exclaimed, O God! make him. I will watch over him with my care through all the dark paths which he may have to tread. Then God made man, and said to him, O man! thou art the child of Mercy: go and deal with thy brother. (Crittenden.)
A condition of receiving mercy
Being sent for by a slave-holder who was seriously unwell, to pray with him, Father Craven approached his bedside and inquired if he had in his will bequeathed liberty to his slaves? No, said the slave-holder, I have bequeathed them to my children. Then, said Father Craven, prayer will be of no avail--God will not show mercy to these who show none to their fellow-men. So he bade him farewell. Soon after a second message was sent for Father Craven to visit the slave-holder and pray with him. He went and asked the slave-holder if he had emancipated his slaves? Yes, said the slave-holder, I have now emancipated them by my will. Will you pray for me? Certainly, said the good man, and he knelt down and commended to God the soul of the sufferer, who seemed near his end. Father Craven agreed with John Jay, a leader in the American revolution, who said, Till America comes into the measure (of abolition) her prayers to heaven will be impious. (Handbook to Scripture Doctrines.)
An all-availing plea
A minister belonging to the Calvinistic Methodists, in a country town, had taught his little boy, who is in his second year, each night before going to sleep, to repeat the prayer: God be merciful to me a sinner. The other Sabbath, while the minister had gone to preach to a village congregation, the child upset the inkstand, and was told his father would whip him for the accident. The minister had no sooner returned, than the child climbed his knee, and putting his mouth close to the fathers ear, softly whispered: Be merciful to me, a sinner, papa. Moved by the ingenuity of the plea, the father kissed his boy, and could not find it in his heart to chide or correct the bright little fellow.
Importance of mercy
Mercy is in the air which we breathe, the daily light which shines upon us, the gracious rain of Gods inheritance. It is the public spring for all the thirsty, the common hospital for all the needy. All the streets of the church are paved with these stones. What would become of the children, if there were not these breasts of consolation? It is mercy that takes us out of the womb, feeds us in the days of our pilgrimage, furnishes us with spiritual provision, closes our eyes in peace, and translates us to a secure resting-place. It is the first petitioners suit, and the first believers article, the contemplation of Enoch, the confidence of Abraham, the burden of the prophetic songs, and the glory of all the apostles, the plea of the penitent, the ecstasies of the reconciled, the believers hosannah, the angels hallelujah. Ordinances, oracles, altars, pulpits, the gates of the grave, and the gates of heaven, do all depend upon mercy. It is the loadstar of the wandering, the ransom of the captive, the antidote of the tempted, the prophet of the living, and the effectual comfort of the dying: there would not be one regenerate saint upon earth, nor one glorified saint in heaven, if it were not for mercy. (The Dictionary of Illustrations.)
Mercy reciprocated
The Marshall DArmont, having taken Crodon, ordered every Spaniard found in the garrison to be put to death. Though it was death to disobey orders, an English soldier ventured to save a Spaniard. He was arraigned for the offence, confessed the fact, and declared himself ready to suffer death if they would save the life of the Spaniard. Surprised at the request, they inquired why he was so much interested. Because, replied he, in a similar situation, he once saved my life. The marshall was so greatly pleased, that he granted him pardon, and saved the Spaniards life as well.
Provision for mercy
Abraham Lincolns doorkeeper had standing orders from him, that no matter how great might be the throng, if either senators or representatives had to wait, or to be turned away without an audience, he must see, before the day closed, every messenger who came to him with a petition for the saving of life.
The law of love
All that is really good is the outcome of the law of love, and its first result and inseparable companion is mercy.
I. FORBEAR.
1. A passion for judging others seems to exist in men. Every one, however backward to amend himself, is ready to correct others. The origin of this spirit is too clear. Deep in mans native selfishness. Exalts self, depresses others.
2. Are we never, then, to judge?
(1) One cannot help forming opinions. It would be indicative of a perverted conscience to regard all with equal complacency. Yes, but this is different from the glad readiness to judge.
(2) Sometimes needful to speak as well as to judge. But not in a censorious spirit, or overbearing tone.
(3) The example of Jesus is the solution of the difficulty. Reprove only when needful. Then in righteous indignation, or in sorrowful rebuke.
II. FORGIVE.
1. Revenge is as natural to man as passing judgment.
2. Often as false and hypocritical, hiding itself under similar disguises.
3. Its root is ultimately the same. Selfishness--contradiction of the law of love.
4. Consequently condemned by example and spirit of Christ. His forgiving mercy was habitual, ready, cordial.
III. GIVE. The more active side of mercy. Opposed to bargaining or exchange--no thought of return. An evidence of sonship of God. When we are merciful, we come nearest to the Divine perfection. (W. R. Clark, M. A.)
Mercy
I. ITS ACTS.
1. Consideration.2. Compassion.
3. Prayer.
4. Helpfulness, according to the need of the object.
II. ITS OBJECTS. Our neighbour.
1. Erring (Jam_5:19-20).
2. Offending.
3. Under persecution.
4. In want.
5. In sickness.
6. In misfortune by the loss of good friends, or the unkindness of bad relations.
III. THE MANNER OF ITS EXERCISE. Acts of mercy are to be performed--
1. With readiness and forwardness of mind (2Co_9:7).
2. With modesty and humility (Mat_6:1).
3. From a kind and merciful, not from a selfish and mercenary temper (Luk_6:32).
4. Without delay (Pro_4:23).
5. Bountifully (1Ti_6:18).
6. With minds full of gratitude to God (1Ch_29:13; 1Ch_29:17).
7. As to Christ Himself (Mat_10:42).
IV. THE BLESSING PROMISED TO THE MERCIFUL. AS for external mercies, the Bible promises them very fully to the merciful.
1. Deliverance out of trouble (Isa_58:10; Psa_41:1).
2. Gods blessing on his labours and undertakings
Deu_15:7-10).
3. The staving off of his trouble, and the lengthening of his tranquility (Dan_4:27).
4. Plenty (Pro_19:17; Pro_3:9).
B Honour (Psa_112:9).
6. Deliverance from enemies (Psa_41:2).
7. God s comforts in his sickness (Psa_51:3).
8. A blessing on his posterity (Psa_37:26).
9. More particularly, mans help in distress and Gods providence. (J. Blair, D. D.)
Are we merciful in our speech to men?
Do we not sometimes take pleasure in making a criticism as sharp and pungent as we can make it? Do we in our literature, in our judgments of the political work or social life of others, strive to speak charitably; or rather, is it not a keen gratification to think that the world enjoys the criticism when the writer is sharp and piquant, and seasons his criticism with that unkindness which sends it home as the feather sends the arrow? (Bishop W. C. Magee.)
Are we merciful as employers of others?
Do we feel that those around us in domestic service, in business, should have their feelings carefully considered? Surely there is a sad want of thoughtful mercy amongst us all I There is no lack of that mercy which comes of being strongly appealed to, and which moves a man to give largely of his money, time, and energy, for the removal of suffering. But the thoughtful, considerate mercy which seeks to prevent suffering and to hinder crime is what we desire to see. (Bishop W. C. Magee.)
The merciful
The world of the natural man is by no means predominantly a merciful world. The tender mercies of the wicked are cruel. A thoroughly bad man is seldom a kind man. The kindliness of a bad man is generally both capricious and selfish. At its best it lacks the essential condition of a Christian charity. Not everything which passes for kindness, not everything which is kindness, is mercy in the sense here intended. There is another word in Scripture, which stands for pity, and the two ideas differ.
1. The objects of pity are the unhappy: the objects of mercy are the undeserving.
(1) Mercy is seen towards those who have no claim upon us. The good Samaritan was merciful as well as pitiful; because the robbed and wounded man whom he succoured was wholly unconnected with him; was not only no relation, but even an alien and of a hostile race.
(2) Mercy is shown, yet more strongly, towards those who have forfeited their claim upon us; those who had a claim, and have lost it. The prodigal son.
2. The nature of mercy.
(1) Sympathy. A fellow-feeling with the undeserving. A deep consciousness of personal demerit, making me at once the equal and the brother of the undeserving.
(2) This sense of fellowship with the sinner is accompanied with a sense of the evil of sin. By this it is prompted.
(3) A desire for the good--the highest good--of the sinful. Mercy rests not in the fall. Mercy is not satisfied with bewailing the misery. Mercy expends not itself in sighs and tears, sits not down with the sorrow and the sinfulness which she both beholds and feels: she looks upward, and she looks onward--upward for help, onward to salvation; and is as ready to succour as she is prompt to sympathise.
3. The working of mercy.
(1) Compassionate thoughts. Mercy, like every grace, has its seat within. We must begin with the heart. The thoughts of mercy will be disciplined into charitableness before she begins to speak or to do. She will recount inwardly the revelation of God concerning sin itself; how it first entered into the world; how it spread its reign hither and thither, till a flood of evil had hidden earth itself from heaven; how it works in the child, struggles for mastery in the man, and leads captive in unsuspected bonds souls born for immortality and for God. She knows how subtle are its workings, how fatal its delusions, how strong its chains. She pities even where she must condemn, and, where she cannot trust, she can at least hope still.
(2) Compassionate thoughts come forth naturally into kindly words. The merciful man speaks mercifully.
(3) Compassionate thoughts and kindly words will run on, lastly, into practical efforts. A man who has a feeling of compassion should always act upon it. (Dean Vaughan.)
Mercifulness
What is it to be merciful? Like other virtues, this, too, has its imitations, worthless and spurious. There is a mercy current among men which is merely an outlet for energy, or the fashion of the day. There is a mercy, so called, which is in reality a luxury, a refined sort of self-indulgence. There is a sort of mercy which people call charity, which gives, but without discrimination or thought. But these, none of these, are mercifulness. No, nor, on the other hand, is it to be confused with pity, a feeling of compassion for the unfortunate; nor has it to do with merely deeds of mercy, acts of kindness. For mercifulness and mercy do not mean the same thing. Mercifulness is what we are and what we do. Mercy, as men count it, may be all outside, no heart in it, or may take its rise from wrong or unworthy motives; while mercifulness must go down to the inner springs of actions, not stop short of guiding principles, have its roots in sound and holy motives. It deals with the quality of the deed rather than the quantity; it examines the texture of which it is made, not the smoothness or bright shimmer; it asks not whether it glitters, but whether it is gold with the true ring.
1. True mercifulness is a characteristic of those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, and they alone will be merciful in Gods way, seeking not to please themselves, but to do His will who is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and plenteous in mercy.
2. True mercifulness is always guided by meekness. It is exercised towards those who have ill requited our kindness, and are undeserving of our mercy.
3. True mercifulness can only be felt by those who have learned to mourn their sin, and in repentance turned unto God, and so have a fellow feeling with those who sin, and long to rescue them.
4. True mercifulness has, as its earliest beginning, poverty of spirit, for only those who in humility know themselves aright will never despair of others, or tire of showing mercy to the undeserving. (C. J. Ridgeway, M. A.)
The mercifulness of God as seen in Christ
1. He was merciful to all, not to some.
2. His mercifulness was provident, thoughtful, wise, seeking the real good of men, marked by the discrimination of prudence, withholding to-day what will do harm instead of good, giving to one what He refuses to another, always keeping before Him as the only true object of mercifulness the well-being of those He came to succour.
3. His mercifulness is unchanging. Time does not wear it out, nor years weaken it. He was merciful even as He loved, unto the end. Many waters could not quench it, neither the floods drown it. The waters came in even unto His soul, suffering and anguish overwhelmed Him; but His mercifulness lived on; it burned like the beacon light of the lighthouse, undimmed by the great storm of affliction that raged around. Nor is He changed now. His mercifulness is as true in His exaltation as in His Passion Heb_2:17-18; Heb_7:24-25). (C. J. Ridgeway, M. A.)
Christs mercifulness and ours
Compare what we call mercifulness with His. His a mercifulness which always kept Gods glory in view, and ours so often centring about self. His a mercifulness shown towards those who were ever seeking His heart, and ours so easily quenched by the first appearance of ingratitude. His a mercifulness that recognized sin as the source of every mans misery, and ours so indifferent to the deepest needs of the men and women around us. His a mercifulness that stooped to help, that touched as well as pitied, and ours always bestowed with a gloved hand, and at a safe distance. His a mercifulness so catholic and wide in its embrace, and ours so narrow and limited by national or religious, or, worse still, party prejudice. His a mercifulness that was provident and wise, and ours capricious and thoughtless, giving to the professional beggar because she importunes us at the very door of the church, or to the man who in veriest cruelty drags little children, often hired for the purpose, through the wet and muddy streets, in the cold and wet, for they are never to be seen on fine days; while to calls that come from those that can guarantee their worth, or to the really poor who will not beg, or to the appeals which are made in Gods house for definite objects, our mercifulness turns a deaf ear. Believe me, it is time for us to learn that true mercifulness is discriminating, thoughtful, wise. His a mercifulness that is always the same, ours so fitful, uncertain, unreliable. His a mercifulness that cost Him self-sacrifice, ours a doing or giving what will not even cost us a thought. His a mercifulness that permeated the whole man in every thought, and word, and deed, ours so superficial, so unreal, our thoughts often breathing harsh judgment upon others, our actions marked by so little consideration of those about us or below us to whom we might be merciful. (C. J. Ridgeway, M. A.)
Christian mercy
I. THE NATURE OF CHRISTIAN MERCY.
1. It has its seat in the heart.
2. It is a supernatural quality.
3. It is an active principle.
(1) It will be manifested toward the inferior animals.
(2) To those of our fellow-creatures who are under bodily affliction and misery.
(3) It will extend to the spiritual miseries of our fellow-min. Mercy to the soul, is the soul of mercy.
(4) Towards our greatest enemies.
II. THE GROUNDS OF CHRISTIAN MERCY.
1. Because it is strictly enjoined by God.
2. Because we stand in constant need of Divine mercy. Were it withdrawn, there would be nothing before us but a fearful looking for of judgment.
3. Because our profession binds us to imitate Christ, who is the perfect pattern of mercy. In Him mercy was embodied. If we are His disciples, we will walk even as He walked.
4. We should be merciful because of the true pleasure which is associated with acts of mercy.
5. Because it is an express condition of our obtaining mercy.
III. THE REWARDS OF CHRISTIAN MERCY.
1. A good name.
2. A peculiar interest in the kind and merciful arrangements of Divine providence.
3. The merciful are blessed with the prayers and blessings of the miserable whom they have relieved.
4. They shall be blessed with the public approval of Christ at the last day. Application:
1. Let the exercise of mercy be pressed on all Christs disciples. Cultivate it. Rejoice in all opportunities of doing good.
2. Let the mercy of God to us be highly valued. We need it daily. Only one channel for its communication--through Christ. Only one way to obtain it--through faith in His word.
3. The unmerciful shall have judgment without mercy. What a dreadful portion to the guilty sinner! (J. Burns, D. D.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv37, 39, 40, 41 37, 38. Judge not. See notes on Matt. 7:1,…
37, 38. Judge not. See notes on Matt. 7:1, 2. Give into your bosom. The loose garment of a Jew was belted at the waist, and in its capacious bosom grain, or other articles, were carried.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
William B. Godbey 1900 · Public Domain On v37 Luk 6:37; Mat 7:1. “Criticize not, in order that…
CHAPTER 20
CRITICISM
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Luk 6:37; Mat 7:1. “Criticize not, in order that you may not be criticized; for with whatsoever criticism you criticize, you shall be criticized; and with whatsoever measure ye measure, it shall be measured unto you.” Luke says: “Criticize not, and ye can not be criticized; condemn not, and ye can not be condemned.” Lord, help us to profit by these plain, practical truths and solemn warnings! The critic’s cap, manufactured in hell and dispensed by the devil, is not at all becoming a saint of the Lord. Loke says if you do not criticize others you can not be criticized. Well, it has been said that curses, like chickens, will come home to roost. If you criticize no one, you will find no trouble by the criticism of others; if they undertake it, it will prove a failure, rebounding on their own heads. A critical spirit is incompatible with deep piety, and if indulged will sap the foundation of a Christian experience, and retrogress sweet, perfect love back into sour godliness, which is Satan’s counterfeit holiness. Lord, save us from a critical and condemnatory disposition!
GOOD MEASURE
Luk 6:38. “Forgive, and you shall be forgiven; give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, heaped up, shaken together, running over, will they give into your bosom. For with the same measure you measure, it shall be measured unto you.” This day in Jerusalem all travelers are astonished at the striking fulfillment of this commandment. Go through the bazaars, and you will see them fill the vessel, shake it down, and run it over. The old Quaker, measuring his wheat and doing just as Jesus commanded, filling, shaking down, and running over, when asked why he gave so bountiful measure, said: “I never can travel this road any more; so I am determined to make everything right as I go along this time.”
BLIND LEADERS
“And He spoke a parable to them, Whether is the blind able to lead the blind? Will they not both fall into the ditch?” No wonder our Savior forbade His own apostles to go out preaching the gospel until they had received the sanctifying baptism of the Holy Ghost and fire. The departure of the Church from that Divine precept has filled the world with blind leaders. The only available remedy in this case is the sanctification of the ministry and the official members.
OUR SAVIOR’S STEWARD OF PERFECTION
“The disciple is not above his Teacher; but every one who has been made perfect shall be like his Teacher.” Jesus is the only unfallen Son of humanity. Perfection is from facio, “to make,” and per, “complete.” Hence it means “made complete.” Jesus, who was always free from depravity, is our only Paragon. Now, He says that “every disciple who has been made perfect shall be as his Teacher.” When He eliminates original sin out of the heart in the glorious work of entire sanctification, in so doing He makes us perfect, and in that respect like Himself; not that we have the perfection of His Divinity, which is absolute and peculiar to God only, but when we get rid of all sin, we have the perfection of His humanity, with the exception of our infirmities, which are the after-effects of sin, and will inhere so long as we are in these mortal tenements, but which He never had, from the simple fact that He was not a personal participant in the fall.
INFIRMITY & INBRED SIN
“Why do you see the mote which is in the eye of your brother, and recognize not the beam which is in your own eye? Or how are you able to say to your brother, Brother, permit me, I will cast out the mote which is in thine eye, thyself considering not the beam which is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam from thine own eye, and then thou shah see clearly to cast out the mote which is in the eye of thy brother.” Mote here symbolizes infirmity, which does not bring any one under condemnation, just as the mote will never seriously injure the eye, much less put it out; while the beam in the eye, if not removed, would destroy it quickly. Now the beam symbolizes inbred sin, a big thing in the heart which will ruin you, world without end, if you don’t have it taken away; while you can go right on to the end of life with infirmities, as it is the province of glorification, which you receive when soul and body part, to take that all away, and let you fly into heaven with a shout. So we find people all around criticizing little things, which are of no serious moment, and never would keep anybody out of heaven, while they themselves have evil tempers, unholy passions, and worldly greed, and perhaps other phases of inbred sin, pride. vanity, lust, envy, jealousy, prejudice, bigotry, which they must get rid of if they ever pass through the pearly portal.
DO NOT WASTE YOUR AMMUNITION
“Give not that which is holy to the dogs, neither cast your pearls before the swine; lest they may trample them under their feet, and, turning, tear you to pieces.”
The dog and the hog are prominent in the Bible as unclean animals, symbolic of spiritual impurity; i.e., carnality. This is a profitable warning, much needed, lest in our enthusiasm we preach holiness to carnal people who are utterly incompetent to appreciate it. Therefore it only makes them mad, so they reject us with contempt, and want to do us violence. Much of the Lord’s ammunition is thus wasted on dead game. As hogs can not eat gold coins and diamonds, but will only get mad because we did not give them corn, so carnal people can not receive the pure gold of holiness and the dazzling pearls of Christian perfection. Like hogs and dogs, they run over them with contempt, trampling them in the mud, get angry, blaspheme, and persecute. Then, what should we preach to the carnal, worldly Churches? Preach Sinai. They do not need sanctification, and can not receive it in their present attitude. They need conviction. They must see an open hell before they will give up their pride, fall down in the dust, and cry for mercy. So long as you preach sanctification to them, you recognize their justification, perpetuate their awful delusion, under which they are fast going down to hell. They need the terrors of the law, the doom of the lost, and the duration of eternity held up before them till they get their eyes open, see their awful condition, and cry for mercy.
THE HOLY SPIRIT CLIMAXES ALL BLESSINGS
“Ask, and it shall be given unto you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. What man is there of you whom his son may ask bread, whether would he give him a stone? If he may ask a, fish, whether will he give him a serpent? If then ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father, who is in the heavens, give good things to them asking Him?” God never gives us anything useless — e.g., a stone; nor any thing injurious — e.g., a serpent. This explains the reason why so frequently our petitions are not answered. How many pray for riches, which, if granted, would prove a mill-stone round their necks, dragging them down to hell! The child cries for the razor. The father, in love, withholds it, and lets it cry on. Our Savior’s illustration, contrasting us fallen beings with our evil natures, and still so delighted to give good gifts to our children, with the pure and unadulterated parental affection of our loving Heavenly Father, who is certainly infinitely more anxious to bestow on His children all things appertaining to their good in this world and that which is to come. As it is impossible for Him to be unkind, do wrong, or even make a mistake, such should be our perfect confidence in His Fatherly kindness and our unconditioned resignation to His will, that we would offer our petitions and leave the answer with Him, at His own discretion, to answer them at His own time and in His own way. We should be so lost in His will that our perfect rest will not be affected in case that He withholdeth the answer altogether, so far as we know.
THE LAW OF RECIPROCITY
“Therefore all things, so many as you may wish that men may do unto you, do ye even so unto them; for this is the law and the prophets.” Here you see that the gospel dispensation, instead of abrogating the law and the prophets, indorses, adopts, and perpetuates them, as a substratum of that universal kingdom which the apostles were commanded to preach to all nations, girdling the globe with salvation and holiness to the Lord, and thus bringing the blessings of the Old Testament Theocracy, which was restricted to the Jews, into every home, blessing every family on the earth with the hallowed truth, glorious light, and heavenly benignity which reigned in the homes of the patriarchs and prophets, thus gathering all nations into one universal fraternity, making every man beneath the skies your neighbor, brother, friend, doing away with all animosities, alienations, and conflicts obliterating the spirit of belligerence from the face of the earth, consolidating Father Adam’s family in one universal brotherhood.
THE GATE & THE WAY
“Enter in through the narrow gate; because wide is the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are going in through it. Because narrow is the gate and contracted the way which leadeth into life, and few there are finding it.”
“Broad is the road that leads to death, And thousands walk together there; while wisdom shows a narrow path, With here and there a traveler.”
This gate stands at the hither terminus of the King’s highway of holiness which leads up to heaven. The gate is so narrow and difficult of entrance that nothing but the immortal soul can make the ingress; all sin, the pomp, pageantry, pride, riches, emoluments, and aggrandizement of the world, must be left behind. This is the reason why so few pass through the narrow gate of regeneration. They hold to many things they can not take with them. Tethlimmene, which qualifies the way we must all travel to heaven, is a perfect passive participle, from thlibo, “to contract,” “squeeze together;” hence it means having been compressed, drawn together, and rendered very narrow and difficult of passage, illustrating the utter impossibility for an encumbered traveler to pass over it. While we are here assured that very few ever find the narrow way, how sad to know that so many of those few, having found it, fail to walk in it to the end! Some are quickly deflected; others hold on a good while, and are then derailed; while not a few comparatively, having long walked in the way, are sidetracked by the enemy; while others have gone on till the bright hills of glory are actually visible, by the eye of faith, from the summits of the Delectable Mountains, and even after this grand proficiency in the Divine life, make shipwreck.
FALSE PROPHETS
“Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, and within are rapacious wolves. By their fruits ye shall know them. Do they gather the grape bunch from thorns or figs from brambles? So every good tree produces beautiful fruits, and the corrupt tree produces evil fruits. The good tree is not able to produce evil fruits, neither does a corrupt tree produce beautiful fruits. Every tree not producing good fruit is hewn down and cast into the fire. Therefore by their fruits ye shall know them.” Luke: “For out of the abundance of the heart, his mouth speaketh.” This beautiful paragraph is our Savior’s exegesis of the gate and the way which lead to death. While the narrow way is but an air-line, narrow as to principle, but broad as to capacity, amply capacious for all the people in the world to walk along it abreast till they enter the pearly gate of the New Jerusalem, the broad way is wide as the world, permitting you to go any way you please except the way of holiness, conferring on you the largest liberty to take your choice among the three hundred and sixty points of the mariner’s compass, and go any way you will. You observe this terrible warning to “beware of false prophets.” Do you see the connection? It is plain and simple. The false prophet is the counterfeit preacher. How are we to know him? By the differentia which Jesus here specifies: a. He broadens the way; i.e., gives his people large liberties, so they can commend him as a “high-toned, level-headed, broad-minded, cultured gentleman.” Therefore he is popular, and they will keep him a long time. Now do not forget that this follows as a legitimate sequence that the false prophet does not preach this narrow gate and contracted way, so difficult to find and walk in, but he is liberal-minded, and preaches a broad-gauge gospel. b. You are to know him by his fruit. You see where the E.V. reads “good fruits,” you have “beautiful fruit,” the literal translation of the Savior’s word. What does it mean? Why, the beauty of holiness; and as Luke says, “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh,” the true prophet not only exhibits the beauty of holiness, but he is full of it. Whenever he opens his mouth, it pours out.
“Having been made free from sin, we have our fruit unto sanctification, and the end everlasting life.” (Rom 6:22.)
Regeneration is the flower, and sanctification the fruit. Now what is the evil fruit against which our Savior warns us? It is anything and everything except holiness.
AWFUL DISAPPOINTMENT
“Not every one saying to Me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of the heavens; but the one doing the will of My Father who is in the heavens. Many will say to Me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Thy name, and in Thy name cast out demons, and in Thy name done many mighty works? And I will confess unto them, That I never knew you; depart from Me, ye who work iniquity.” This paragraph describes the false prophets above, in the judgment-day, coming up with their grand and glowing reports of demons cast out — i.e., many souls converted; and many mighty works — i.e., great, fine churches built, powerful sermons preached, and wonderful official triumphs. But do you not see our Savior rejects them altogether? The truth of the matter is, they have never been His preachers at all. The devil, robed as an angel of light, played off on them in the beginning, calling and sending them. So they have been preaching Satan’s counterfeit gospel all their lives, counting many converts and doing many mighty works, helping the devil to delude the people and lead them to hell in solid columns. What is the remedy for these awful troubles in the end? Be sure you pass the narrow gate, so difficult of entrance that it will try your flint and steel, and test your stamina to the very bottom. Then be sure that you travel the self-denial way of “holiness to the Lord.”
William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On v41 Luk 6:41 - Luk 6:49.
Luke
THREE CONDENSED PARABLES
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Luk 6:41 - Luk 6:49.
Three extended metaphors, which may almost be called parables, close Luke’s version of the Sermon on the Mount, and constitute this passage. These are the mote and the beam, the good and bad trees, the houses on the rock and on the sand. Matthew puts the first of these earlier in the sermon, and connects it with other precepts about judging others. But whichever order is the original, that adopted by Luke has a clear connection of thought underlying it which will come out as we proceed.
I. The striking and somewhat ludicrous image of the beam and the mote is found in Rabbinical writings, and may have been familiar to Christ’s hearers.
But His use of it is deeper and more searching than the rabbis’ was. He has just been speaking of blind guides and their blind followers. That ‘parable,’ as Luke calls it, naturally images another defect which may attach to the eye. A man may be partly blind because some foreign body has got in. If we might suppose a tacit reference to the Pharisees in the blind guides, their self-complacent censoriousness would be in view here; but the application of the saying is much wider than to them only.
Verse 41 teaches that the accurate measurement of the magnitude of our own failings should precede our detection of our brother’s. Christ assumes the commonness of the opposite practice by asking ‘why’ it is so. And we have all to admit that the assumption is correct. The keenness of men’s criticism of their neighbour’s faults is in inverse proportion to their familiarity with their own. It is no unusual thing to hear some one, bedaubed with dirt from head to foot, declaiming with disgust about a speck or two on his neighbour’s white robes.
Satan reproving sin is not an edifying sight, but Satan criticising sin is still less agreeable. If only ‘he that is without sin among you’ would fling stones, there would be fewer reputations pelted than there are. Most men know less about their own faults than about their brother’s. They use two pairs of spectacles-one which diminishes, and is put on for looking at themselves; one which magnifies, and is worn for their neighbour’s benefit. But when their respective good qualities are to be looked at, the other pair is used in each case. That is men’s way, all the world over.
Christ’s question asks the reason for this all but universal dishonesty of having two weights and measures for faults. He would have us ponder on the cause, that we may discover the remedy. He would have us reflect, that we may get a vivid conviction of the unreasonableness of the practice. There is nothing in the fact that a fault is mine which should make it small in my judgment; nor, on the other hand, in the accident that it is another’s, which should make it seem large. A fault is a fault, whoever it belongs to, and we should judge ourselves and others by the same rule. Only we should be most severe in its application to ourselves, for we cannot tell how much our brother has had, to diminish the criminality of his sin, and we can tell, if we will be honest, how much we have had, to aggravate that of ours. So the conscience of a true Christian works as Paul’s did when he said ‘Of whom I am chief,’ and is more disposed to make its own motes into beams than to censure its brother’s.
The reason, so far as there is a reason, can only lie in our diseased selfishness, which is the source of all sin. And the blindness to our ‘beams’ is partly produced by their very presence. All sin blinds conscience. A man with a beam in his eye would not be able to see much. One device of sin, practised in order to withdraw the doer’s attention from his own deed, is to make him censorious of his fellows, and to compound for the sins he is inclined to by condemning other people’s.
Luk 6:42 teaches that the conquest of our own discovered evils must precede efficient attempts to cure other people’s. To pose as a curer of them while we are ignorant of our own faults is, consciously or unconsciously, hypocrisy, for it assumes a hatred of evil, which, if genuine, would have found first a field for its working in ourselves. An oculist with diseased eyes would not be likely to be a successful operator. ‘Physician, heal thyself’ would fit him well, and be certainly flung at him. A cleansed eye will see the brother’s mote clearly, but only in order to help its extraction. It is a delicate bit of work to get it out, and needs a gentle hand.
Our discernment of others’ faults must be compassionate, not to be followed by condemnation nor self-complacency but by loving efforts to help to a cure. And such will not be made unless we have learned our own sinfulness, and can go to the wrongdoer in brotherly humility, and win him to use the ‘eye-salve’ which our conduct shows has healed us.
II. The second compressed parable of the two trees springs from the former naturally, as stating the general law of which Luk 6:42 gives one case, namely, that good deeds {such as casting out the mote} can only come from a good heart {made good by confession of its own evils and their ejection}.
It is often said that Christ’s teaching is unlike that of His Apostles in that He places stress on works, and says little of faith. But how does He regard works? As fruits. That is to say, they are of value in His eyes only as being products and manifestations of character. He does not tell us in this parable how the character which will effloresce in blossoms and set in fruits of goodness is produced. That comes in the next parable. But here is sufficiently set forth the great central truth of Christian ethics that the inward disposition is the all-important thing, and that deeds are determined as to their moral quality by the character from which they have proceeded.
Our actions are our self-revelations. The words are not to be pressed, as if they taught the entire goodness of one class of men, so that all their acts were products of their good character, nor the unmingled evil of another, so that no good of any kind or in any degree is in them or comes from them. They must be read as embodying a general truth which is not as yet fully exemplified in any character or conduct.
In Luk 6:45 the same idea is presented under a different figure-that of a wealthy man who brings his possessions out of his store-house. The application of the figure is significantly varied so as to include the other great department of human activity. Speech is act. It, too, will be according to the cast of the inner life. Of course, feigned speech of all sorts is not in view. The lazy judgment of men thinks less of words than of deeds. Christ always attaches supreme importance to them. Intentional lying being excluded, speech is an even more complete self-revelation than act. When one thinks of the floods of foul or idle or malicious talk which half drown the world as being revelations of the sort of hearts from which they have gushed, one is appalled. What a black, seething fountain that must be which spurts up such inky waters!
III. The third parable, of the two houses, shows in part how hearts may be made ‘good.’
It is attached to the preceding by Luk 6:46. Speech does not always come from ‘the abundance of the heart.’ Many call Him Lord who do not act accordingly. Deeds must confirm words. If the two diverge, the latter must be taken as the credible self-revelation. Now the first noticeable thing here is Christ’s bold assumption that His words are a rock foundation for any life. He claims to give an absolute and all-sufficient rule of conduct, and to have the right to command every man.
And people read such words and then talk about their Christianity not being the belief of His divinity, but the practice of the Sermon on the Mount! His words are the foundation for every firm, lasting life. They are the basis of all true thought about God, ourselves, our duties, our future. ‘That rock was Christ.’ Every other foundation is as sand. Unless we build on Him, we build on changeable inclinations, short-lived desires, transitory aims, evanescent circumstances. Only the Christ who ever liveth, and is ever ‘the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever,’ is fit to be the foundation of lives that are to be immortal.
Note the two houses built on the foundations. The metaphor suggests that each life is a whole with a definite character. Alas, how many of our lives are liker a heap of stones tilted at random out of a cart than a house with a plan. But there is a character stamped on every life, and however the man may have lived from hand to mouth without premeditation, the result has a character of its own, be it temple or pig-sty. Each life, too, is built up by slow labour, course by course. Our deeds become our dwelling-places. Like coral-insects, we live in what we build. Memory, habit, ever-springing consequences, shape by slow degrees our isolated actions into our abodes. What do we build?
One storm tries both houses. That may refer to the common trials of every life, but it is best taken as referring to the future judgment, when God ‘will lay judgment to the line, and righteousness to the plummet’; and whatever cannot stand that test will be swept away. Who would run up a flimsy structure on some windy headland in northern seas? The lighthouses away out in ocean are firmly bonded into living rock. Unless our lives are thus built on and into Christ, they will collapse into a heap of ruin. ‘Behold I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain On v37 J. W. McGarvey's The Fourfold Gospel [XLII. G. Law…
J. W. McGarvey's The Fourfold Gospel [XLII. G. Law Concerning Judging].
XLII. THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT. (A Mountain Plateau not far from Capernaum.) Subdivision G. LAW CONCERNING JUDGING. aMATT. VII. 1-6; cLUKE VI. 37-42.
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a1 Judge not, that ye be not judged. c37 And judge not, and ye shall not be judged [Here again Jesus lays down a general principle in the form of universal prohibition. The principle is, of course, to be limited by other Scriptural laws concerning judgment. It does not prohibit: 1. Judgment by civil courts, which is apostolically approved ( 2Pe_2:13-15, Heb_13:17, Tit_3:1). 2. Judgment of the church on those who walk disorderly; for this also was ordered by Christ and his apostles ( Mat_18:16, Mat_18:17, Tit_3:10, 2Th_3:6, 2Th_3:14, 1Jo_1:10, 1Ti_1:20, 1Ti_6:5). 3. Private judgment as to wrong-doers. This is also ordered by Christ and his apostles ( Mat_7:15, Mat_7:16, Rom_16:17, 1Jo_4:1, 1Co_5:11). The commandment is leveled at rash, censorious and uncharitable judgments, and the fault-finding spirit or disposition which condemns upon surmise without examination of the charges, forgetful that we also shall stand in the judgment and shall need mercy ( Rom_14:10, Jam_2:13). Our judgment of Christians must be charitable, ( Joh_7:24, 1Co_13:5, 1Co_13:6) in remembrance of the fact that they are God's servants ( Rom_14:4); and that he reserves to himself the ultimate right of judging [260] both them and us-- Rom_14:4, 1Co_4:3, 1Co_4:4, 2Co_5:10]: a2 For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured unto you. cand condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: release, and ye shall be released [Though God shall judge us with absolute justice, yet justice often requires that we receive even in the same measure in which we have given it, so in a sense the merciful receive mercy, and the censorious receive censure ( Jam_2:12, Jam_2:13). But from men we receive judgment in the measure in which we give it. Applying the teaching here given locally, we find that Jesus, having condemned the Pharisees in their manner of praying, now turns to reprove them for their manner of judging. Their censorious judgments of Christ himself darken many pages of the gospel. But with a bitter spirit they condemned as sinners beyond the pale of mercy whole classes of their countrymen, such as publicans, Samaritans, and the like, besides their wholesale rejection of all heathen. These bitter judgments swiftly returned upon the heads of the judges and caused the victorious Roman to wipe out the Jewish leaders without mercy. It is a great moral principle of God's government that we reap as we sow. Censorious judgment and its harvest are merely one form of culture which comes under this general law]: 38 give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, shall they give into your bosom. For with what measure ye mete it shall be measured to you again. [This is not necessarily a promise of the return of our gift in kind. It rather means that we shall receive an equivalent in joy and in that blessedness which Jesus meant when he said, "It is more blessed to give than to receive." The figurative language is borrowed from the market where the salesman, grateful for past kindnesses, endeavors, by pressing, shaking, and piling up, to put more grain into the measure for us than it will contain. Pockets were unknown to the ancients, and what they wished to take with them was carried in the fold in the bosom of the coat, the girdle below holding it up. [261] Ruth bore this a heavy burden in her mantle which, in the King James Version is mistakenly called the veil-- Rth_3:15.] 39 And he spake also a parable unto them, Can the blind guide the blind? shall they not both fall into a pit? [Whoso lacks the knowledge of divine truth can not so lead others that they shall find it. They shall both fall into the pitfalls of moral error and confusion.] 40 The disciple is not above his teacher: but every one when he is perfected shall be as his teacher. [Pupils do not surpass their teachers, or, if they do, they are self-taught, and hence do not owe to their teachers that wherein they rise superior to them. All that the scholar can hope from his teacher is that when he is perfectly instructed he shall be as his teacher. But if the teacher is a blind man floundering in a ditch, he affords but a dismal prospect for his pupils. The perfection of such teaching is certainly not desirable.] a3 And why beholdest thou the mote [chip or speck of wood dust] that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam [heavy house timber] that is in thine own eye? 4 Or how wilt { ccanst thou say to thy brother, Brother, let me cast out the mote aout of thine eye; cthat is in thine eye, when thou thyself beholdest not the beam that is in thine own eye? aand lo, the beam is in thine own eye? 5 Thou hypocrite, cast out first the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye. cthat is in thy brother's eye. [In Matthew and Luke Jesus gives slightly varying applications to this allegorical passage by setting it in different connections. In Luke, as we see, he places it after the words which describe the disastrous effect of being blind leaders of the blind. It therefore signifies in this connection that we ourselves should first see if we would teach others to see. In Matthew he places it after the words about censorious judgment, where it means that we must judge ourselves before we can be fit judges of others. The thought is practically the same, for there is little difference between correcting others as their teachers or as [262] their self-appointed judges. Jesus graphically and grotesquely represents a man with a log, or rafter, in his eye trying to take a chip or splinter out of his neighbor's eye. Both parties have the same trouble or fault, but the one having the greater seeks to correct the one having the less. The application is that he who would successfully teach or admonish must first be instructed or admonished himself ( Gal_6:1). In moral movements men can not be pushed; they must be led. Hence those who would teach must lead the way. Those who have reformed their own faults can "see clearly" how to help others. But so long as we continue in sin, we are blind leaders of the blind.] a6 Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast your pearls before the swine, lest haply they trample them under their feet, and turn and rend you. [The connection here is not obvious. This saying, however, appears to be a limitation of the law against judging. The Christian must not be censoriously judicial, but he should be discriminatingly judicious. He must know dogs and swine when he sees them, and must not treat them as priests and kings, the fit objects for the bestowal of holy food and goodly ornaments. Dogs and swine were unclean animals. The former were usually undomesticated and were often fierce. In the East they are still the self-appointed scavengers of the street. The latter were undomesticated among the Jews, and hence are spoken of as wild and liable to attack man. Meats connected with the sacrificial service of the altar were holy. Even unclean men were not permitted to eat of them, much less unclean brutes. What was left after the priests and clean persons had eaten was to be burned with fire ( Lev_6:24-30, Lev_7:15-21). To give holy things to dogs was to profane them. We are here forbidden, then, to use any religious office, work, or ordinance, in such a manner as to degrade or profane it. Saloons ought not to be opened with prayer, nor ought adulterous marriages to be performed by a man of God. To give pearls to swine is to press the claims of the gospel upon those who despise it until they persecute you for annoying them with it. When such men are known, [263] they are to be avoided. Jesus acted on this principle in refusing to answer the Pharisees, and the apostles did the same in turning to the Gentiles when their Jewish hearers would begin to contradict and blaspheme. Compare Mat_15:2, Mat_15:3, Mat_21:23-27, Act_13:46, Act_19:9.]
[FFG 260-264]
J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v38 See, Pro 28:27 (See Scofield "2Co 8:1")
Give
See, Pro 28:27 (See Scofield "2Co 8:1")
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On vv36, 39 The measure of mercifulness:
The measure of mercifulness:
v. 36. Be ye therefore merciful as your Father also is merciful.
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v. 37. Judge not, and ye shall not be judged; condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned; forgive, and ye shall be forgiven;
v. 38. give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again.
Not only kindness and goodness is enjoined upon the Christians, but also mercy or mercifulness, something of that divine quality which had compassion upon us in Christ, our Savior. This will include refraining from officious judging and condemning of our neighbor, of his person and manner of life. Some forms of judging are enjoined by Scripture, as that of the erring brother, Mat 18:15, that of people in public office under a democratic form of government, and others. But so far as the personal life and transgressions of our neighbor are concerned, we must practice forgiveness if we wish to receive forgiveness. We must give if we hope to receive; the measure of God’s gracious kindness being filled in proportion to our sympathetic compassion: a good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and flowing over the top will be our portion if we practice the kindness whose example we have received so richly in our own lives. The generousness of our own nature and the graciousness of God’s spirit are placed side by side, for our emulation, since the thought of His plenteous redemption should be a spur for us, Psa 130:7. "Where this mercy is not found, there is no faith. For if thy heart is full of faith that thou knowest that thy God has shown Himself thus to thee, with such mercy and goodness, without thy merit and altogether for nothing, while thou wert still His enemy and a child of eternal curse: if thou believest this, thou canst not refrain from showing thyself to thy neighbor in the same manner, and all that for love of God and for the benefit of thy neighbor. See to it, then, that thou make no difference between friend and enemy, worthy and unworthy; for thou seest that all those mentioned here have earned the opposite of our love and goodness. " "Therefore, if thy brother be a sinner, cover his sins and pray for him. If thou reveal his sin, thou art truly not a child of the merciful Father, for else thou wouldst be merciful like Him. That surely is true, that we cannot show such mercy to our neighbor as God has shown to us, but that is our great wickedness, that we act contrary to mercy; and that is a sure sign that we have no mercy."
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv37, 38, 39, 41 Do not judge
Do not judge
"Do not judge people" or "Do not harshly criticize people"
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and you
"and as a result you"
you will not be judged
Jesus does not say who would not judge. Possible meanings are 1) "God will not judge you" or 2) "no one will judge you" (See: Active or Passive)
Do not condemn
"Do not condemn people"
you will not be condemned
Jesus does not say who would not condemn. Possible meanings are 1) "God will not condemn you" or 2) "no one will condemn you" (See: Active or Passive)
you will be forgiven
Jesus does not say who would forgive. Possible meanings are 1) "God will forgive you" or 2) "people will forgive you" (See: Active or Passive)
translationWords
judge
condemn
forgive
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv37, 38, 41 6:37-42 Do not judge others: Jesus condemned hypocritical judgment…
6:37-42 Do not judge others: Jesus condemned hypocritical judgment that denigrated another person. Those who condemn others will be judged by that same standard. God requires his people to love others by warning them of the dangers of sin (Gal 6:1; Heb 3:13). Exhortation is an act of love; judgment is an act of pride.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.