You can’t lead someone where you haven’t been (The speck and the log Matthew 7:1-5)

You can’t lead someone where you haven’t been (The speck and the log Matthew 7:1-5)
No matter which direction you are coming from North, South, East, or West I can give you directions to my house. This is simple for me because over the past 20 years that I have lived in my home I have approached my home from every possible direction, I mean I literally come home every day. It is easy to lead someone to a place that I am so familiar with, but it is a completely different story if you ask me to give you directions to somewhere that I have never been. I may be able to google it, ask someone else for you, or possibly even pull out an atlas to give you general directions but without me ever being there I am not sure how accurate my directions would be. When Jesus tells us to first get the beam out of our own eye before we seek to get the speck from someone else’s eye, I do not think we grasp how valuable it is for those around us that we got our mess straight first. When we have been set free of the sin that binds us, we are now free to lead to lead others to the same freedom we have experienced in our lives.
It would be hard for me to tell someone how to overcome an addiction to drugs or alcohol in their life because I have never even tried either much less been addicted to them. I can tell them the answer to their addiction is Jesus Christ and know with one hundred percent accuracy that is correct, but I have no idea what it is like to lay on the floor shaking from withdrawals knowing that what I am trying to escape will make it stop. But there are plenty of Christians who have allowed the Holy Spirit to set them free from addiction that could walk along beside that person and help them along their journey to freedom. Getting the beams (sins) out of our life first makes us a valuable resource for those who are trying to get to where we have already made it. As Christians, we should make it our mission to lead others to freedom and help them get the specs out of their eyes. Our escape doesn’t make us any better than anyone else, but it does make us a qualified tour guide to show others how to get to where we are at.