“We are all sinners in need of a savior” 

April 3, 2005.  Pastor Matt

This week:  “We all have sin and we all need a savior”

Last week we I mentiones as a part of my sermon that we all have sin and if we stood up and confessed it to each other, we could all let loose, relax, and be real around each other.

I am going to share with some of you what others have told me about you…dark secrets

Just kidding

Today we are going to put aside the myth that we are “good” and we don’t have problems

We are going to find unity in the fact that we all have sin and we all need a savior

Now that we know that we all have sin, what are we going to do about it?

Read Matthew 7:1-5

I. WE ARE NOT GOING TO BE THE JUDGE OF OTHERS

(1-2) "Do not judge, or you too will be judged.  For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

What does it mean to judge others?

-         It is having a holier than thou attitude….look how spiritual I am compared to you

-         It is being a critic of those in the church…criticism has no place in the church

-         It is being overly critical, always going around with a nit-picking attitude, digging and searching for faults, always suspecting the worst. 

-         It is "jumping to conclusions". It’s at the very heart of gossiping and rumors

o       if we see the good in people, we will not to gossip about them

-         It is a belief that I can see as God sees. I can see your motives. I can see the way you’re thinking.

-         Even if you have walked a mile in someone’s shoes, you really do not know them or what they’ve been through

o       A saying in the counseling world is be nice to everyone for everyone’s life is hard

in the context of this passage, it means to not judge others in relation to the sin in their life

Why?

(1) "Do not judge…”

-         We are commanded to not judge. 

o       It is as if God is saying do it "Because I’m your dad”

§        As a believer we should want to follow the Commands of Christ!

(2) “For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”

-         The nature of people is to fight fire with fire

o       Don’t dish out what you can’t handle yourself. 

§        If you are going to judge others, you better expect them to judge you

·        Do you want your flaws pointed out by others?

What is the second thing we are going to do know that we know we are all sinners in need of a savior?

 II. WE ARE NOT GOING TO BE HYPOCRITES

(3-4) "Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?  How 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?  You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye…”   

Important to know:  A hypocrite is someone who goes around pointing out the sins of others and yet makes no attempts to remove the sin from their own life.

The Church is full of hypocrites, not because people who sin go to church but because a hypocrite is someone who knows the things of God, pretends to be Mr. Holy, and refuses to change.

Please turn to John 8:2-9

At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them.  The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, "Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery.  In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?"  They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.   But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger.  When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, "If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her."  Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.  At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there.

What do we seed here?  We see the super religious (or so they thought) judging the sinner

The most religious men of their day were not without sin

As “mature Christians,” we never get to the point where we have a right to look down on others

To do so would be hypocritical………To do so would be wrong

Let me challenge you for a moment……. Jesus was the good shepherd.  He protected the sheep.  Will you do the same?  Will you come between the wolf and your brother or sister in Christ?  In reality, sheep bite other sheep when they get confused.  (A dog bites its owner when it is confused)

We don’t even have to let the wolf in the sheep pen because we are tearing each other up.

What kind of sense does that make?  Did you know church is supposed to be a safe place? 

The Lord want us to work on the sin we have in our own life.  What else?

III. WE ARE GOING TO BE HELPERS

Remember that helping is not looking down on someone, instead, it is coming alongside each other, as fellow sinners who need a savior

Matthew 7: 5.  You 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.

The Bible is not a “self-help” only manual. 

We are not to read it, fix our own problems and then live our life in a nice neat little bubble.

Some of us see those around us who are hurting and struggling and we say things like…

….It’s not my problem

We live in a self-help society were people try to keep to themselves and look out for only #1

Heaven forbid if our rough edges rub up against each other.

Do you know that the Christian life was never meant to be tackled by yourself?

You cannot live the Christian life by yourself.  God gave you a family to help you. 

As dysfunctional as we may be, we are your family.

Matthew 7: 5.  You 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.

Don’t look the other way when someone needs your help

Think about it:

How many of you have ever worked through a problem without the help of someone else?

IV. WE ARE GOING TO SEEK HELP

John 8:10-11. 

Jesus straightened up and asked her, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?"  "No one, sir," she said.   "Then neither do I condemn you," Jesus declared. "Go now and leave your life of sin." –

Jesus does not give us license to live it up. 

To the contrary, He commands us to turn from sin.

A Christian is someone who goes around helping others remove sin from their lives and seeks help removing sin from their own life.

If you truly believe in what Jesus did for you on the cross, you will automatically want to live for Him.

If you don’t want to live for Him, I challenge you to re-visit the Cross

Are you willing to receive the help?

I would venture to say that allowing others to help you with the sin in your life is like allowing someone to put their finger in your eye and gentle remove the speck of dust

-         it requires trust

-         Intimacy

-         Gentleness

-         Poking your finger in the eye of someone who does not want it will not work

Once someone accepts Him they realize they are filling their life with poison called sin and that is when we can come alongside them and help them with the struggles that are eating them alive from the inside out

Closing

I challenge you to take your stone and the sin and lay it at the altar.

Let's put down our stones so that we might not throw them at each other.