Is it not judging to tell a sinner a scripture against the person’s sin? So, for example, if someone tells a gay that homosexuality is a sin according to 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, is it not a judgment that Jesus taught not to do in Matthew 7:1? Is the idea coincident with the teaching of Jesus? I want to look at two Bible teachings to answer this question. One is from Matthew 7:1-5. The other is the commandment of love (John 13:34-35; 1 Corinthians 13:1-7).
It must be agreeable for all Christians that we can learn about judging others from Matthew 7:1-5. Jesus teaches us not to judge unrighteously. However, He is not banning all judgments but unrighteous judgments. Therefore, we must judge righteously (John 7:24). So, in Matthew 7:1-5, the brother has a speck in his eyes. That is true. Another brother may want to help him remove the speck from his eyes. However, according to Jesus, even though he is telling the truth, it is not a righteous judgment. Therefore, it is evident that judgment is not necessarily righteous even if the person is telling the truth, such as scriptures.
Then, there must be something that makes telling the truth unrighteous. It is trying to pick the specks in the brother’s eyes while the person has a log in his eyes. What is wrong here? First of all, he doesn’t know that he is blind. In other words, he is not able to see appropriately, and it is because he has a log in his eyes. So it means that he doesn’t know that he is blind. So he barely sees but acts as if he sees better than the brother having only a speck in the eyes.
It is like an eye surgeon who has a severe eye infection. He barely sees but attempts treatment on his patients’ eyes. The problem with this surgeon is that he has no idea he doesn’t meet the condition to help his patients. That is the log that blinds him, and it is the problem. So then, what is having the log in the eyes? Let’s look at the other scripture.
Jesus commanded his disciples to love one another (John 13:34-35). And 1 Corinthians 13:1-7 teaches nothing can be righteous without love. So, the necessary condition for a righteous judgment is to have love. However, the person has a log in his eyes, and he doesn’t know if he meets the condition for him to be able to help the brother. Therefore, having a log in the eye means he doesn’t know he doesn’t have love. So, it is like Jesus is saying in Matthew 7:1-5: If you don’t love your brother, don’t do anything to your brother; If you pronounce the judgment, it is not righteous. So then, lacking love makes even telling the truth an unrighteous judgment.
Ephesians 4:15 teaches us this principle. It says we have to “speak the truth in love.” Christians should indeed speak the truth. First, however, we must love the person we tell the truth. Without love, whatever we do may be a sin against the Lord or, at best, nothing. So, if we do not love people, we must focus on ourselves until our hearts have love.
Then, according to this principle, what should we do to our gay or homosexual friends? First, we must fill our hearts with the love we learned from Jesus. Also, we must have genuine love for our gay friends. If we have genuine love and the truth, which is the word of God, then the Holy Spirit will lead us to do the best thing for our friends.
Telling sinners the scriptures against sin is not necessarily righteous. If we do so without genuine love of the sinners, we may not be helping them but hurting them. In other words, we may not be helping Jesus but hindering Him. Without love in us, we gain nothing by whatever we attempt. Without love, we can’t earn our sinning friends, to which God called us. So, we must first look into our hearts to see if love exists. Otherwise, we need to keep silent and focus on ourselves. If we boldly tell the scriptures against our sinning friends before we have love, we judge them unrighteously and push them away from the kingdom of God, whom Jesus died for.
The Pure Gospel 
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