God's tool belt for unity
God's tool belt for unity
What needs to be fixed? Repentance in relationships.
When I was 18, I worked in a cabinet shop. I made raised panel doors. My closest coworker was a 55-year-old man who had a drinking problem. Sometimes he even came to work a little under the influence. One day while I was sawing some boards on a table saw, a splinter flew up into my eye. With liquor on his breath this fellow came over to “help” me. Holding a pencil, he raised up his hand and said, “Here, let me get that out for you.” “Not a chance!” I thought. The last thing I needed was some dizzy person digging around in my eye with a pencil. I could not have a trusting relationship with that man until he sobered up. He must deal with the beam sticking out of his own eye—the abuse of alcohol—before he could help me get the splinter out of mine.
The same is true of every other relationship. We cannot be in close, trusting relationships if we will not deal with our own sins. So many people stumble trying to help others by criticizing them and correcting them when all the while they are caught up in their own failures. It is a spiritual truth: we must first understand our own sins and turn to Jesus for forgiveness. In other words we must be repentant before we can help anyone else repent.
In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus gives us this rule of thumb about relationships. Look at how he says it:
1Do not judge, or you too will be judged. 2For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.
3Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 4How can you say to your brother, “Let me take the speck out of your eye,” when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? 5You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye (Matthew 7:1-5).
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