One day, the religious leaders brought a woman caught in adultery to Jesus (John 8:1–11). They said, “In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” Jesus responded, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” The crowd dispersed as each person realized his own sinfulness. Only Jesus was worthy to cast the first stone, and He chose not to do so.

That same spirit is behind today’s teaching. “Do not judge” does not mean to “never judge,” as it’s often misinterpreted (vv. 1–2). After all, we’re instructed to judge or evaluate fellow believers when accountability is needed (1 Cor. 5:12). Instead, “do not judge” means that we should not judge self-righteously or hypocritically. We will be judged by the same standard we use on others.

Judgmental hypocrisy means, among other things, to criticize others when we are actually guilty of the same thing ourselves (vv. 3–5). Jesus uses a humorous but tragic image to drive His point home: It’s like a man with a wooden plank in his eye criticizing a man who has only a speck of sawdust in his. Having a judgmental spirit can warp our perspective! Notice that Jesus didn’t say to ignore the problem or to pretend everything’s okay. Rather, we should fix our own problem before we help someone else.

The next verse implies that we should pick the right time to do so (v. 6; Prov. 13:10). If we choose the wrong time, the person won’t listen. It will be like throwing pearls before swine. They’ll simply trample on our advice or reproof. Something valuable is bound to be wasted in this case, and the original speaker might even be harmed as well.

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