Luke 6:37 :

Don’t judge,
and you won’t be judged.
Don’t condemn,
and you won’t be condemned.
Set free,
and you will be set free.

People love to quote this verse when they are caught doing something wrong. It is clear from Jesus’ own example and from the example of all of the apostles that this doesn’t mean that you are never to accuse someone of sinning. Because it is so obvious that Jesus accused people and judged their actions, we have to assume that this is not what Jesus means.

The context and the original language tell us that Jesus is talking about passing final judgment about a person. In other words, it is judging a person in such a way that you assume you know who they are inside.

We are not to assume that we know peoples’ motives. People may look horrible on the outside, but that doesn’t mean that we know that they are going to hell. We cannot and should not assume we know who someone is on the inside.

We should, however, judge people’s actions as to whether they are good or bad. It would be inconsistent for Jesus to judge others by telling them not to judge unless this was true.

I think it is obvious that based on this verse alone, we all belong in Hell. We have all judged and we should be judged. We have all condemned and should be condemned. We don’t set others free so we shouldn’t be set free. Jesus’ words really hurt because they expose the true evil in our hearts. Jesus could condemn us and He would be right to do so, but He didn’t. He set us free instead. From a legal perspective, we should have been judged and condemned and never set free but Jesus paid the price for our condemnation and he died for our judgement. Now we are free and because of this, we don’t want to judge, or condemn. Now we want to help set others free too.