WHAT IS THE BEAM?

I want to share a part of a chapter found in the book "The Calvary Road." The quote is discussing Mathew 7:3-5. In this passage we are told to examine ourselves then we will see clearly how to help our brother. Here is the section.

"Now we all know what Jesus meant by the mote in the other person's eye. It is some fault which we fancy we can discern in him; it may be an act he has done against us, or some attitude he adopts towards us. But what did the Lord Jesus mean by the beam in our eye? I suggest that the beam in our eye is simply our unloving reaction to the other man's mote. Without doubt there is a wrong in the other person. But our reaction to that wrong is wrong too! The mote in him has provoked in us resentment, or coldness, or criticism, or bitterness, or evil speaking, or ill will - all of them variants of the basic ill, unlove. And that, says the Lord Jesus, is far, far worse than the tiny wrong (sometimes quite unconscious) that provoked it. A mote means in the Greek a little splinter, whereas a beam means a rafter. And the Lord Jesus means by this comparison to tell us that our unloving reaction to the other's wrong is what a great rafter is to a little splinter! God have mercy on us for the many times when it has been so with us and when in our hypocrisy we have tried to deal with the person's fault, when God saw there was this thing far worse in our own hearts. But let us not think that a beam is of necessity some violent reaction on our part. The first beginning of a resentment is a beam, as is also the first flicker of an unkind thought, or the first suggestion of unloving criticism. Where that is so, it only distorts our vision and we shall never see our brother as he really is, beloved of God. If we speak to our brother with that in our hearts, it will only provoke him to adopt the same hard attitude to us, for it is a laoad y Rw of human relationships that "with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again."

That is very challenging! Our unloving reaction towards another's perceived sin is just as bad or worse than what we are seeing in someone else. We have a responsibility to act and react out of love. Think on that for awhile. Also I DARE you to get a copy of The Calvary Road by Roy Hession and read it. It is a great and powerful book. I have 2 copies if someone is interested.