November 27, 2016
Be careful how you judge others, since the way you judge others is the same way others will judge you—Matthew 7:1 (King Jimmy Translation).
The Drunk Cowboy
As the patrons filed into the theater, they noticed the tall, lanky old cowboy laying across three seats, apparently, passed out in a drunken stupor. They called an usher.
A pimpled teenage usher rushed to the scene. “Oh, my goodness. I’m so sorry, folks. Please get up, sir!” he said politely, but red-faced. “I’m sorry, but we don’t allow drunks in here.”
The youngster’s attempts to rouse the cowboy failed. “I’m getting the manager.”
The manager’s anger turned into rage when he saw the cowboy passed out across the seats. “Let’s move it, drunk!” he shouted. His curses did little to rectify the situation. His uncouthness only created uneasiness among the patrons.
His threats didn’t bother the cowboy. He lay there, grunting, his arms and legs spread out.
The manager pulled out his phone. “I’m calling the police.”
“We’ve got an old cowboy drunker-than-a-skunk.” The manager led the policeman down front. “He’s taking up a whole row.” A crowd now surrounded the cowboy. Some looked on with pity, others with contempt.
The officer got in the cowboy’s face. “Can’t hold yer liquor, eh? You been drinking all day?” he said. “What’s your name, cowboy?”
He muttered inaudibly.
The officer got closer. “Can’t hear you.”
“Sam,” the cowpoke barely whispered. “My name’s Sam.”
“Well, come on, Sam. You’re going to the drunk tank and sober up.” The officer pulled out his handcuffs. “Where’re you from, Sam?”
With painful effort, Sam raised his arm halfway, pointed his boney index finger upward. “From the balcony.”
Ole Sam wasn’t drunk—he just had a bad fall. Those around him were quick to pass a false judgment without knowing the details.
“He’s drunk!” they claimed.
“He a derelict,” another reasoned.
“Look, little Johnny,” a mother pointed toward Sam. “If you don’t eat your vegetables, you’ll end up like him.”
That was a mirror of me, Jimmy-the-perfect-judge-of-others, before God’s grace.
We see them every day—those who’ve had a “bad fall in life.”
Some, dressed in mismatched Goodwill clothes, wait on street corners holding cardboard signs “Please Help God Bless.” Others appear normal and functioning, but walk around nursing a wounded spirit.
She fled domestic violence empty-handed. Now, she has nothing.
Did the unskilled worker lose his job in the economic downturn and couldn’t find employment?
How did one little social drink lead to the bondage of alcoholism that destroyed his family, his career, and his hopes?
He went off to war, eager to battle evil and free the oppressed, only to return home a broken man, his life disillusioned with shattered dreams. The government he fought for cast him aside, leaving him with the horrors trapped in his mind that no one should see. He’s alone, tormented by the demons that followed him home. He seeks anything to quiet the storm in his soul.
Pathetic! I thought. What losers. When I compared my life to theirs, in my eyes, I looked pretty good. I didn’t know and didn’t care what caused their fall from the balcony. In my sanctimonious spirit, as a well-dressed, gainfully employed, educated [?] Aggie, I was sure I had not—nor would I—fall from the balcony.
God agreed 100 percent. I would not fall. Instead, in my rebellion, I chose to jump off the balcony. (What was I thinking?) But today, now greatly humbled and restored, I am who I am and have what I have only because of God’s grace and nothing else. Those whom God has rescued from the power of sin [read: ourselves] can testify that the same grace that rescued us redeems anyone who calls on Jesus. He turns no one away.
One warm spring day, while holding church on a hillside for a few thousand folks, Jesus taught how people should treat one another. In their religiosity, they quickly judged other’s actions and spirituality. Judgement was either a thumbs-up or a thumbs-down. Those who believed in God differently received the harshest criticism.
Jesus wasted no time in addressing this spiritual issue. Why do you pick apart the character of others, judging their actions or motives? Can you see into the depths of their hearts like I do? NO! You can’t. Have you seen everything they are going through? No, you haven’t. This judging-others has a way of backfiring on you. Surely you don’t want to be judged unfairly, do you? Just don’t think you are higher on the pecking order than your actually are. Prideful people will fall, and fall badly. Remain humble, don’t judge unfairly, and allow me to build you up.
Are there folks in your world with peculiar traits that make you want to scream? Do they dress funny, or still have 70s hairstyles and wear those pointed-tip eye-glasses? How about the guy with the mullet who says the strangest things that leaves you shaking your head like what planet is he on? Some are our neighbors. Others go to church with us. We give them the once-over and make a snap-judgment, Man! —are they strange?
Wanna please me? the Holy Spirit said. Don’t judge—pray for them. That’s my will for you.
Lord God, drive a judgmental attitude far from us. May we see others as you see them and pray that your grace changes their life, as your grace has changed us.
Stay close to Jesus.
Jimmy
P.S. Later, during an epiphany, I realized those people I thought socially backward and weird were thinking the same thing about me. Hummm.
Jimmy Eskew © 2016
THANKFUL 
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