The critics

From Brenan Mannings book, The Signature of Jesus:

Only when we clam the love of the crucified Christ with heartfelt conviction, this love that transcends all judgements, can we overcome all fear of judgement. As long as we continue to live as if we are what we do, as if we are what we have, and as if we are what other people think about us, we will remain filled with judgements, opinions, evaluations, and condemnations. We will remain addicted to the need to put people in their place.

Yet to the extent that we embrace the truth that our core identity is not rooted in our success in ministry, or in popularity with kids and parents or with power in the local church, but in the passionate, pursuing, infinite - what GK Chesterton calls "Furious" love of God embodied in his crucified Son - to that degree we can let go of our need to judge our friends, spouses, children, pastors, gays, straights, Asians, Caucasions, and the sin- scarred wino on the street. We can be free from the need to judge others by claiming for ourselves the truth, "I am the disciple whom Jesus loves."