What were Jesus’ three Cs?
Do not condemn.
Do not condone.
Commend.
Why are Jesus’ three Cs important?
They tell important lessons about Jesus and about us.
Where does the concept of Jesus’ three Cs come from?
The concept is taken from Jesus’ interaction with the Samaritan woman at the well in John 4.
Jesus and the disciples were traveling home to the Galilee region and the shortest route took them through Samaria.
Samaria was the homeland of a mixed-tribe people. They did not associate with Jews because the Jews believed them to be in error about their theology.
Nevertheless, the band traveled through the area and stopped at a well (believed to be a gift to the patriarch Jacob centuries before) outside the town of Sychar.
Jesus sent the disciples into town to get food. He sat down to wait until a woman carrying a bucket arrived around noon.
You can read the gospel story here.
What do Jesus’ three Cs mean?
After Jesus asked the woman for a drink of water, she asked him a pointed question:
“How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.
10 Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.
John 4: 9-10 NKJV
Jesus didn’t condemn her for her nationality. He was looking at her soul.
(Wikimedia Commons)
(Condemn means to declare evil, to pronounce guilty, to denounce as a reprobate.)
After her amazement when Jesus offered her water that will never run dry, He encouraged her to bring back her husband to talk with him.
17 The woman answered and said, “I have no husband.”
Jesus said to her, “You have well said, ‘I have no husband,’ 18 for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband; in that you spoke truly.”
John 4: 16-18 NKJV
See what Jesus did there? He did not condone her relationships with the “non-husband.”
Instead, Jesus commended her, he praised her, for telling the truth. She didn’t try to whitewash, rename, or hide the fact of her living situation. She acknowledged the truth–thus demonstrating she recognized her behavior for what it was.
So what?
Jesus knew the truth about the Samaritan woman. He saw an outcast, a lonely woman separated from her community.
He knew her hurt–five previous husbands gone, in one way or another.
Jesus recognized her soul needed encouragement and certainly redemption.
He spoke to what He knew, and what she needed to hear. Jesus had answers to her problem, or the one main answer: eternal life.
He didn’t condemn the woman for not being Jewish or coming to the well alone in the heat of the day (the women of the town would have come earlier in the day).
Jesus didn’t condone her illicit relationship.
He commended her for telling Him the truth.
No fire. No brimstone. Jesus didn’t pick up a rock to throw at her.
He saw her for what she was–but more importantly, that she needed the living water of salvation only Jesus could/and currently can provide.
Why are the three Cs important?
We live in a hostile world that delights in insulting and harming one another.
Jesus brought good news to the Samaritan woman–and he does the same for us.
How can we tell if the voice in our mind that always criticizes us comes from God or from somewhere else?
What is that voice saying to us?
Is it condemning us and trying to reassure us that what we know is wrong really isn’t wrong?
How does that make you feel?
If it’s negative and condemning, it’s not coming from the God who created you and who loves you.
But, you have to be honest with Him.
Jesus offered the Samaritan woman eternal life and assured her that her status didn’t matter to him.
What mattered was her honesty.
Her response?
“Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet . . .
God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”
The woman said to Him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When He comes, He will tell us all things.”
Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am He.”
John 4: 19-26 NKJV
Jesus’ three Cs assurance remains true today.
Listen to the voices. Are they condemning?
They’re not from God.
Are they calling you back to Him?
Jesus is waiting and happy to provide living water.
Thanks be to God.
Tweetables
Jesus’s three Cs to the Samaritan: what are they today? Click to Tweet
The Biblical model: Jesus doesn’t condemn, condone, but commend. Click to Tweet
Great post! I really enjoyed it.