The Home Inspector Who Missed His Own Roof

In 2019, a home inspector named Gary Redmond in suburban Columbus, Ohio, made his living walking through other people's houses, cataloging every crack in the foundation, every faulty wire, every sagging gutter. He was meticulous — his reports ran thirty pages, his Yelp reviews glowed. Clients trusted him completely.

Then one November evening, a section of Gary's own roof collapsed into his bedroom. The joists had been rotting for years. Water damage had crept through the attic insulation, warped the plywood, and finally given way. His neighbors were stunned. The man who could spot a hairline fracture in someone else's basement wall had never once climbed a ladder to inspect his own shingles.

Jesus tells a story like this in Luke 6 — about the person so busy tweezering a splinter from a neighbor's eye that they cannot see the two-by-four lodged in their own. It is not that discernment is wrong. Gary's skill was real and valuable. But the Lord asks a piercing question: Why do you see the speck in your brother's eye but ignore the log in your own?

The passage ends with a house built on rock versus one built on sand. The difference is not knowledge — Gary knew exactly what structural failure looked like. The difference is application. Hearing the words of Christ and actually doing them. The Almighty is not impressed by our ability to diagnose everyone else. He is asking whether we have examined our own foundation.