Judging

There is a lot of talk about judging. People who don't even really believe in the Bible or follow its teachings will admonish Christians if any comment is made concerning whether an activity is good or bad. Russ and I were remembering some people we met in Dayton and in doing so were reminded why we humans aren't good judges.
The most shocking lack of judgement was in our reaction to a man who was always dressed nicely, spoke politely, even seemed to have great faith in God and Jesus Christ, quoting scriptures fairly comfortably. He came to church regularly and served when called as well as helping a lot of people on his own. We ended up getting into a limousine business with him and he ran us into bankruptcy due to his illegal use of the business credit card, mounting up bills that just couldn't be paid no matter how hard we tried. He had tried numerous times to get Russ to purchase an insurance policy "for the sake of the business, just in case"........After we left the area, he murdered his "wife" (circumstances too involved to go into) then another man, planning to profit from their insurance policies and is now in prison.We certainly didn't correctly "judge" him to be a man it was safe to go into business with.
The next man I will mention is a "contractor"- I put that word in quotes because, beyond having a knowledge of the cheapest labor available in the area and some knowledge of construction, he wasn't all that great. Because the roof of the house we were rehabbing was so high and steep, we decided having Russ try to put on a new roof was not a good idea, yet it needed to be done. This man seemed pleasant enough, drove a decent truck- not fancy but good enough, and was clean-looking. He even occasionally appeared with his young grandson in his truck because he was tending him. He found people to do the work so it was done well enough. Then one day he came to us with his head hung low saying he was short on funds and wondered if we could "lend" him $500- just until he got paid for another job he was doing. We had known him for a year or so by then so we were happy to do it. We waited in vain for him to return and repay us. We even managed to track down where he lived and went to inquire when he might be able to pay us. He pleaded broke and was out of work. We never got our "loan" back.
The third man, Clarence, was a shiftless druggie. He drank and did some drugs. He didn't have a car and always walked everywhere. We met him through the "contractor". He was pleasant enough to deal with. He did a good job, as long as it was simple work. Before the loan incident with the contractor, he warned us that if we had Clarence do work for us we needed to wait until the work was completed to pay him or he would disappear on a binge. That warning came after we had paid him for some painting that he had not yet completed. We wondered for several days after we paid him whether he would ever come back to finish and had about decided we would have to do it ourselves. Then one day he showed up, apologized, and said he wasn't always dependable about finishing a job on time but he tried to always be a man of his word so he was back to finish what he had promised to do. He finished the work and didn't ask for any more money.
We had earnestly attempted to discern the trustworthiness of each of these men especially since our financial outlook was on the line. Looking on the outside of these men, expectations would be just the opposite of the end result. The one who looked so good was the worst in his heart and the one who looked the shabbiest was actually just weak in willpower but had good intentions. I thought, too, about the woman I mentioned in my last post- the female part of the "swinger" couple. She was attractive enough but I couldn't believe how easily she justified having an "open relationship" with her husband. Despite the responsibility of 3 children, she lusted after men other than her husband and tried to explain how it was "good for her marriage". She appeared to be very much into appearance, with nice clothes and jewelry and a lovely home with quality furnishings. Seeing her in any casual, happenstance setting, no one would ever guess the lifestyle she led.
Despite what the critics of Christians say, we do all judge- all the time. We need to make judgements on who to trust to care for our children, who to trust in business transactions of all sorts. Unfortunately, as hard as we try, we cannot judge completely correctly all the time. We can only see the cover of the book, not the contents. So we will continue to do whatever judging is required for our life decisions, but it's a really good thing that ultimate judgement is up to God. Only He really knows.