Judge or Accountability?

Nowhere in the Bible does it talk about believers not holding other believers accountable for their actions. The important part of accountability is remembering some key points.

1) Accountability must be relational – It is much easier to hold someone accountable for an issue if you have a relationship with them. Relationships imply a “love factor” that realizes the accountability is to help your relationship grow stronger. If you are willing to hold someone accountable, you are also willing to, in the best of your ability, invest in the relationship for the long haul to help restore that person to a better way of living.

2) Accountability must be Biblical – Sometimes our culture confuses mere conveniences or personal preferences for Biblical truth. When we point out a failure or hold someone accountable for an action we must make sure we are coming from a godly point of view. Our accountability to others and towards others must begin with our accountability to God’s word.

3) Accountability must be forward-moving – Accountability is not a case of calling someone out and then ignoring the relationship (see point #1), instead accountability is for the purpose of positive steps to helping someone become emotionally or spiritually healthy. Accountability must always cause someone to make positive changes, not have negative emotions (although at the time there could be negative emotions such as denial, anger, etc…) in the long term.

I hope this helps the next time someone accuses you of judging them when in reality you are just trying to hold them accountable. I also hope this helps in making sure that our accountability is not passing a judgment on a person. As always, thanks for reading and I appreciate any feedback!