Judge Not

The Savior, our greatest example of not being judgmental and of loving others.

I’ve been thinking about this lately. The natural man in us judges others. How do we overcome it? How to we see each person as a child of God? Most of the time the judgments just come- as thoughts. Perhaps we think to ourselves, “Why did they choose to wear THAT?” Or maybe we wonder why the overweight person is eating a cookie. Simple, little ridiculous thoughts we have about others. There are countless ways we judge others, perhaps on a daily basis. A lot of the time we don’t even recognize what we’ve done.

There is a really good talk that was given this last conference about this topic. Elder Gregory Schwitzer of the seventy says: “Often incorrect judgments are made because of limited information or because we do not see beyond that which is immediately in front of us.” (“Developing Good Judgment and Not Judging Others,” Elder Gregory Schwitzer, Ensign, May 2010.) How true that is. We don’t always know why people are the way they are or why they do what they do. The fact of the matter is that each person is a child of God- a child of God who is loved by Him and who should be loved by us too.

To develop this capacity to love others and not judge them takes work, conscious effort, and the Spirit. We can pray for love and understanding. We can pray to not be critical of others. Then we can put it in to action. Having the Spirit will help us overcome the natural man in us. The Spirit will help us see others as they are.

I’ve come to realize that judging others is destructive behavior. It eats away at you. You become less spiritual and more prideful. That’s exactly what Satan wants. He’s happy when we judge others.

I am reminded of a line from a wonderful church hymn which says, “Who am I to judge another, when I walk imperfectly?” How true that is. I am so far from perfect. In fact, I definitely need to work on this- which is probably why the Spirit reminded me of its importance.

But, anyway, I just wanted to share these things that have been on my mind.