speck in your eye

“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” Matthew 7:3

My daughter came home with a speck in her eye.  On recess the wind was blowing and before she knew it she had something in her eye.  She came home complaining.  I looked and saw a speck.  We washed the eye, rubbed the eye, eye dropped the eye, still the speck didn’t move.  The eye was getting more and more red, so we went to see the doctor.  He simply numbed the eye and removed the speck, put some ointment in her eye and sent us on our away……with a great lesson of how irritating a speck can be.

I immediately thought of this verse and how many times I’ve been reminded of it in the last few months.  I’ve thought a lot about how quick we are to rush to judgment of someone and their ‘situation’.  I admit that it is very easy to do.  You hear about things and its pretty easy to put people in a ‘category’, assuming that they and their situation must fit into the judgment box we’ve created. Recently, I’ve felt how damaging this rushing to judgment can be in my own personal life.  The verses prior to this one say “Do not judge lest you be judged.  For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you”.  That word ‘Judge’ in these verses means to form and express a judgment or opinion as to any person or thing in an absolute sense. 

So, when I saw that speck and how much it hurt my daughter but yet how small it was, it reminded me that the speck in someone else’s eye is probably enough of an irritant, they probably don’t need any help pointing it out!  God doesn’t need our help, He’s the one that has authored the consequences of a speck in the eye, the irritation it causes. In many ways pointing out the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye can cause them more hurt then they are already experiencing due to the speck.  Not to mention the fact that if we are judging that speck when we have a LOG of our own, then God will judge us by our own standard of measure! 

God removes the speck! He alone has the grace to reveal it and He alone takes it out.  Today, I contemplate God’s great work in my own ‘eye’, gently pointing out the speck and allowing me the opportunity and the time for Him to remove it.  The speck can be removed as simply as my daughters speck was removed, it says so in Matthew 7:7 “Ask and it shall be given you; seek and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you”

God come and remove the LOG that is in my eye, continue the heart surgery you are doing in me; that I may have the grace to leave all judgment to You and You alone. You are faithful! Thank you God for specks in our eyes, that are enough of an irritant to turn our eyes back to you.  Thank you that you are a God of Justice and you will make all things new.  I ask and you give, I seek and I find, I knock and You open the doors.  You my God have my heart and now take the speck(log) from my eye!