Self-Knowledge and Self-Judgement
True Self-judgment shuts out the adversary.
The more we exercise ourselves in Self-judgment, the more will the flesh in us be discerned by ourselves, and the less will it be seen by others.
In our exercise of Self-judgment, we should keep our eye upon the Advocate with the Father, else we shall have a self-vexing conscience which profits not.
Self-examination is a solemn and profitable business it should mainly consist in this, “My soul, believest thou? lovest thou?” (Heb. 11:6)
The custom of Self-judgment is among the best of spiritual habits.
“The Lord is a God of knowledge, and by Him actions are weighed” (1 Sam. 2:3). Because God tries the heart, therefore, in instances innumerable, God’s judgment condemns where man may approve and praise.
The oftener we invite Him with whom we have to do to use the keen edge of “the sword of the Spirit” in our own consciences, the less will there be in us for Satan’s fiery darts to fix upon.
If we better considered that “we have an Advocate with the Father” (1 John 2:1). He knows all our circumstances, and the power of temptation and trial. Let it be the first business of the conscience to think of this “Advocate with the Father;” then what child of God will be slow to make confession whenever it is due?
Each one of us has in himself some especially besetting evil—a weight to be laid aside. (Heb. 12:1.)
Let me ask the Lord to give me self-knowledge; for self-knowledge, though a painful, is a necessary thing, worth all the trouble of the search, and all the mortification it may cost me.
When Israel suffers defeat before Ai, it is time to do what should indeed have been done before: to search out the Achan in the camp. (See Joshua 7)
When I see a brother overtaken in a fault, let me beware of my own besetments, and seek to restore him in the spirit of meekness.