The Umpire

Good morning and welcome in today. Today we’re going to talk about a passage of scripture but before we do that I wanted to ask you a question.

Are you the kind of person who watches sports? Maybe you watch baseball or football, and have noticed that in a lot of these sports competitions they have umpires who make judgment calls based on the rules and regulations of the game. A lot of things have changed in the past few years because now they have cameras and instant playback. If one of the teams decides to refute the play, they can go to the instant replay and take a look at it. There have been numerous occasions when an umpire has called a base runner out when he was actually safe, and the judgment call that he made was wrong. Bad judgments have even been made in courtrooms when people were put into prison but then later released because they never committed the crime in the first place. Consider Joseph who had the same kind of thing happen to him when he was falsely accused by Potiphar’s wife. Even our precious Lord Jesus who created everything that we see was judged unjustly, and then crucified upon the cross. 

This reminds me of the Christian Life. 

Be very careful if you are going to make unjust and hypocritical judgments towards others, because the same will be measured back to you again. 

Matthew 7:1-5 (KJB)  Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again. And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye.

Before judging things in others, you need to make sure you are not committing the same sins yourself. You need to make sure that you are walking in the faith and examining your own life. The Apostle Paul was judging the church and referring to them as reprobates, but he certainly wasn’t living like that himself! 

2 Corinthians 13:5-6 (KJB)  Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates? But I trust that ye shall know that we are not reprobates.

Judgments have to happen within the church, because if people are going to live in sin without repenting, then they need to face some type of consequences. This is for the safety and protection of God’s sheep, which is exactly what happened in 1st Corinthians chapter 5.

1 Corinthians 5:3-5 (KJB)  For I verily, as absent in body, but present in spirit, have judged already, as though I were present, concerning him that hath so done this deed, In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, to deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.

1 Corinthians 6:2-5 (KJB)  Do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world? and if the world shall be judged by you, are ye unworthy to judge the smallest matters? Know ye not that we shall judge angels? how much more things that pertain to this life? If then ye have judgments of things pertaining to this life, set them to judge who are least esteemed in the church. I speak to your shame. Is it so, that there is not a wise man among you? no, not one that shall be able to judge between his brethren?

The main thrust of our lesson today is standing in judgment over others while you are involved with the same type of immoral behavior yourself. That is called hypocrisy. Can you imagine your dad grounding you for the weekend because you didn’t put the tools away in the garage, but then the next week you realized he did the same thing and his tools were all over the place? That is called hypocritical judgment, and it’s the kind of judgment that is not supposed to be happening within the church. If you are going to rebuke somebody for sinful acts such as fornication, then you had better not be committing fornication yourself!  Judgment must first begin in the house of God, but you cannot condemn the sinfulness of theft when you are doing the exact same things yourself. Before standing in judgment over others, you must make sure that you judge yourself first!

1 Corinthians 11:31 – For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged.

You can’t judge and condemn disobedience when you yourself are disobedient. 

2 Corinthians 10:6 (KJB)  And having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience, when your obedience is fulfilled.

Whenever you make judgments between what is right and wrong, you had better make sure that you are doing what is right yourself. Hypocrisy is claiming to have moral standards or beliefs to which your own behavior does not conform. Jesus called the religious leaders of his day hypocrites because they had an outward appearance of righteousness but deep inside their hearts they wanted to kill Him. They wanted to crucify him even when Pilate was determined to let him go. But in their hypocritical judgment, it wasn’t just a man that they were treating unjustly, it was the creator of Heaven and Earth! Judge not by appearance or in a hypocritical manner, which is exactly what was done to Christ Jesus the Lord. The following passage explains about the huge consequences for judging hypocritically. 

Romans 2:1-11 (KJB)  Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest: for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things. But we are sure that the judgment of God is according to truth against them which commit such things. And thinkest thou this, O man, that judgest them which do such things, and doest the same, that thou shalt escape the judgment of God? Or despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and longsuffering; not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?

But after thy hardness and impenitent heart treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God; Who will render to every man according to his deeds: To them who by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory and honour and immortality, eternal life: But unto them that are contentious, and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, indignation and wrath, Tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil, of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile; But glory, honour, and peace, to every man that worketh good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile: For there is no respect of persons with God.

Judgment must happen in the house of God, but this is so the church continues to keep themselves aligned with the teachings of scripture, and continues to walk on the narrow path of Christ Jesus. Just remember that God is not mocked, and if you are going to make unjust and hypocritical judgments about others, it’s going to come right back on your own head. By your words you shall be justified and by your words you shall be condemned. Just make sure that you always make righteous judgments, so that you never have to go back and watch the instant replay, only to realize that you made the wrong call, just like,…..

……The Umpire

Let’s think about these things for right now. We can be found on your web browser by searching, tlkjbc where you can find our diaries distributed through various platforms. We are not associated, nor affiliated with any other religious groups. You can get our entire podcast feeds directly, along with transcripts at tlkjbc.com or I suppose that you could find us somewhere up here, in the Great Northern Minnesota woods. Peace to you all, and Lord willing, we will talk with you some more tomorrow. Till then, bye bye everybody.♥️

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(Note: This Bible study was originally published in 2021 under the same name and then re-edited for the purpose of improving and  fine-tuning the main discussion points in the lesson. The old version was replaced and the new version was republished in 2026.