James 4:12

NIV: There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the one who is able to save and destroy. But you— who are you to judge your neighbour?

The Message: God is in charge of deciding human destiny. Who do you think you are to meddle in the destiny of others?

This all ties back to Jesus' words regarding the most important of the Ten Commandments:

Mark 12:28-31 One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, Of all the commandments, which is the most important?

The most important one, answered Jesus, is this: 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.  Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.  The second is this: 'Love your neighbour as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these.' (NIV)

God gave us the ten commandments as a standard to live by.  He is a god of love, not hate, and His laws, the Ten Commandments, are written in love, to help us b e the people He always designed and created us to be.  There is only one lawgiver, God, and only one judge, God.  He gives is the law and He judges whether we have obeyed the  law.  And this does not mean whether we have kept within the letter of the law, whether we have driven at 30 miles an hour or 31 miles an hour.  This is more of a case, I reckon, of keeping the law within our hearts. 

This doesn't mean that we can, for instance, drive above the speed limit and then tell ourselves it was all right, because in our hearts, we were only doing 30 miles an hour.  No, this is a case of trying to keep the law in our hearts, of knowing instinctively what is right or wrong and trying to do right, not wrong.  Not because of the threat of eternal damnation and the fires of hell though, no, but keeping the law because of the love we have for God, because it is His law and He set it for a reason. 

This also doesn't mean that the law is the be all and end all of life.  After all, we are saved because of our faith in Jesus, of our knowing that He is the Son of God who died on the cross to save each and every one of us from the rightful punishment that is due to us because of all the sinful things we have each done.  Because of Jesus' sacrifice on the cross, God no longer remembers our sins, they have been cast as far as the East is from the West, no matter what we have done. 

This does not mean we can just ignore God's rules though because we have been forgiven.  Paul has words to say on this in (all bible verses below taken from the Message):

Romans 4:4-5 If you're a hard worker and do a good job, you deserve your pay; we don't call your wages a gift. But if you see that the job is too big for you, that it's something only God can do, and you trust him to do it—you could never do it for yourself no matter how hard and long you worked—well, that trusting-him-to-do-it is what gets you set right with God, by God. Sheer gift.

Romans 4:16a This is why the fulfilment of God's promise depends entirely on trusting God and his way, and then simply embracing him and what he does. God's promise arrives as pure gift. That's the only way everyone can be sure to get in on it, those who keep the religious traditions and those who have never heard of them. 

Romans 6:1-2 So what do we do? Keep on sinning so God can keep on forgiving? I should hope not! If we've left the country where sin is sovereign, how can we still live in our old house there?

Romans 6:5-11 Could it be any clearer? Our old way of life was nailed to the cross with Christ, a decisive end to that sin-miserable life—no longer at sin's every beck and call! What we believe is this: If we get included in Christ's sin-conquering death, we also get included in his life-saving resurrection. We know that when Jesus was raised from the dead it was a signal of the end of death-as-the-end. Never again will death have the last word. When Jesus died, he took sin down with him, but alive he brings God down to us. From now on, think of it this way: Sin speaks a dead language that means nothing to you; God speaks your mother tongue, and you hang on every word. You are dead to sin and alive to God. That's what Jesus did.

I reckon all this means that when we become Christians, we no longer have to abide by the law, the ten commandments, but because of our love of God, our love of Jesus, and the Holy Spirit, who lives within each believer, we will want to obey the law anyway.  It's somewhat like when you pass your driving test.     When you are still a learner driver, you have to know the Highway Code in order to pass (here in the UK) your theory test.  When you finally become a fully fledged driver, with a full driving license, that does not mean you throw away the Highway Code.  It should mean that you still want to keep it, abide by the rules because you know these are set for your safety and the safety of others. 

The Highway Code is there for a reason, just as God's laws are there for a reason.  We can't just ignore them once we become Christians on the grounds that we are saved by grace.  They are set through love to help protect each one of us.  God is a god of love, full of grace and mercy,  slow to anger, quick to forgive.  He knows the reasoning behind each and very law, each of the commandments, and when we set ourselves up as judges of others, we are in a way, setting ourselves on a par with God.  But who are we to judge others?  What right do we have to look over and criticise others for the way they are living their lives, to find fault with the things they do, set ourselves up as better than them?  After all, we are no better than anyone else because we have all sinned and God does not judge the severity of the sin, so a mass murderer is dealt with more harshly than someone who has only ever told one little white lie.  No, the fact of the matter is, if we have committed only one sin, no matter how big or small, we are separated from God and it is only through grace, through Jesus' sacrifice that we are saved.  Nothing we can do would ever be good enough to put us right with God, only by accepting God's grace, by receiving Jesus as our Lord and Saviour, are we saved.

This always brings me back to Jesus and the woman caught in adultery.  When the Pharisees found her and brought her to Jesus, insisting she be stoned because she had been caught out (no mention of the man, though, and surely he would have been caught too.......), not one word of criticism or censure did he speak.  He would have known better than anyone there  just which law she had broken and what she was guilty of, yet he did not agree that she should be stoned, despite all the evidence supporting her guilt. 

So if Jesus did not judge someone one caught in a blatant transgression, who are we to judge others?  We are told to love our neighbour as ourselves not to judge our neighbour when he makes a mistake or breaks the law.

We need to leave it up to God to do the judging, because only He can see straight into the heart of each one of us and know the motives, the reasons, the heart behind each and every act.