Mistake and Imperfection: On Judging Others

“Judge not, that ye be not judged”
-Matt 7:1 (KJV)-

Pastor Kong once preached on the topic of the sermon on the mount.
In this passage, Lord Jesus preached the danger of being censorious.
A censor is a person who always finds fault in others and harsh in evaluation.
While Lord Jesus still wants us to make moral judgment, He wants us to have mercy whenever we judge others.

Recently, I have been making a lot of careless mistakes in my research.
It cost me dearly: long hours of sample preparation went in vain.
A part of me told myself to learn from those mistakes and to move on.
However, another part of me questioned God: “Why did this happen, oh God? It was supposed to be a simple step”

I felt the Lord answering me: I made mistake so I can bear with other people’s mistake too.
Be it mistake in term of work or moral mistake ( I still fall into sin once in a while), any mistake I do shows me that I am imperfect.
How can an imperfect being harshly judge another imperfect being?
I still need to judge others in term of work or moral value. However, I am to be gracious in my judgment.

Strictly speaking, only Lord Jesus has the right to judge harshly since He is perfect.
Still, He chose to judge in mercy.
We can see His gracious judgment to the adulterous woman in John 8.

Another thing I read in a book (by Dr. James Dobson) regarding judging others is that before I can tell that person his/her mistake,
I need to make sure I build genuine relationship with him/her first before I can (graciously) criticize.
This is to make sure that person does not misunderstand me.
Otherwise,  I should keep my mouth shut.

I have been hearing a lot of bad news about people around me, especially the Christian friends.
It is not that I was involved in gossip or anything. I only listened as a friend poured out heart content at me.
“This person is like this and that… That person is like this and that..”
Well, I was surprised when I heard that initially. But of course, even Christians are not perfect.
Still, I don’t think I am close enough to them yet in order to give a constructive criticism.
I can only pray that God will somehow touch them..