A couple Sundays ago our message in service was a continuation of Jesus’s teaching in the Sermon on the Mount. Our primary passage was the section in Matt. 7:1-5 which is the familiar plank/speck in the eye section:
7 “Do not judge, or you too will be judged. 2 For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. 3 “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? 4 How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.
Early on in the sermon Pastor Steve gave a visual of the plank and speck by having a full-length proper 2” X 4” brought in and compared it to a grain of sawdust. It was striking to see the large piece of lumber up front on the remembrance altar for the entire sermon. What was even more striking for me was how it juxtaposed itself to the two large pieces of lumber lashed together as a cross at the back of the stage.
I spent a lot of time during the sermon and for some time after thinking and reflecting on that juxtaposition. Jesus gave us this teaching it seems so we would be introspective regarding our own sins. There is a sense of humility that He is stressing we must adopt in order to see how to partner with Him in establishing His Kingdom. Jesus, with neither planks nor specks in His eyes, saw clearly how He would accomplish the work He and the Father had agreed on beforehand. Jesus carried the very timbers of our sins up to Calvary, climbed onto them and sacrificed Himself. Despised and abused by men with more metaphorical planks than actual sense, Jesus crafted a literal cross of planks to offer reconciliation to these same men back to the Father.
While it is the planks in our eyes that make up the cross of Calvary, they also continue to remind us of that cross and our on-going need for its saving power. Throughout this whole sermon Jesus gives there is an expectation that His audience would be seeking the will of the Father along with His Kingdom and His righteousness. We cannot do this if we are still walking around with the sins Jesus died for filling our eyesight. It is not until we are humble enough to allow Him to remove the plank in our own eye that we truly understand the grace that He demonstrated through the Cross.
However, this humility is not meant to paralyze us into inaction regarding others. Jesus finishes this statement with the removal of our brother’s speck as well. It is important to recognize our need for plank removal surgery because as Jesus promised earlier in this sermon, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.” (Matt. 5:8). This “seeing God” is what enables us to see others as He sees them. It enables us to love others as He loves them. It enables us to speak truth to them as the Holy Spirit speaks truth to them. And as always, the Cross is at the center of it all…two planks lashed together to offer forgiveness of sins; planks, specks, and everything in between. Blessings to you all!
