Lesson 3: God’s Righteous Judgment – 2:1-11
 1 Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things.
2 We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things.
3 Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God?
4 Or do you presume on the riches of His kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?
5 But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.
6 He will render to each one according to his works:
7 to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, He will give eternal life;
8 but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury.
9 There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek,
10 but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek.
11 For God shows no partiality.

Our verses today tell us God, in His righteous judgment, holds us accountable for two relationships. The first is our relationship with Himself, as we learned in the first chapter. The second is our relationship with others.

It is human nature to compare ourselves to someone else. We do not want to compare ourselves to God because we always look like losers. So we compare ourselves to others around us. There are usually more people we feel better than in this comparison because we think we are better than they are, so the comparison makes us look good. To make this comparison even greater, we then want to call attention to all the bad things the other person does – things we do NOT do.


In our verses today, God says we have no right at all to judge another person in this way because we are equally guilty of doing wrong.

God’s judgement, as promised in Verse 6 and following, will be on our works. For the believer, these works will be judged according to our motive for doing them – see 1 Corinthians 3:11-15. For the one who has chosen not to believe in and accept Jesus’ solution to sin, their works will be judged according to God’s perfect standard. And since He looks at the heart rather than at outward actions (1 Samuel 16:7), He will judge every work by our motives.

But this brings us back to the first verse of today’s Scripture – a warning against passing judgment on others. This warning is often quoted by those who tell us we have no right to say they are wrong when they sin. They are right in that we have no right to condemn – that kind of judgment belongs only to Jesus. But we are called by Him to warn people who are walking down the wrong path. In Ezekiel 33:6-9 we are warned that if we know destruction is near and we do not warn those in danger, then their blood is on our hands. Again, in 1 Timothy 4:16 He tells us if we preach the Truth there is a good possibility the other will hear the warning and will turn from their wicked way and be saved. Whatever we say we MUST say in love (Ephesians 4:15) rather than in anger or condemnation.

When we love Him with all our heart and soul and mind and strength, we cannot help but love those whom He also loves – everyone around us (Matthew 22:37-39). We then fear the judgment coming for them enough to warn them about it.

*If Jesus would come today, what in your life would you wish He would not have to see? Today is the time to ask Him to help you remove that thing from your heart and life.