I could not disagree more. Love and judgment go together. In order for God to save, he must also judge. He can't pretend as if the world is whole when anyone with half a brain can readily seen that it isn't. Furthermore, God can't merely cover up the evil that has defaced his good creation and has made a mockery of his noble intentions. If God ignores evil, then he's neither loving nor good. If God does not stand against oppression, hatred, racism, injustice, and sexual perversity, then he does not love. But because he does love, he also judges.
I believe this will probably work in at least two ways. First, there will be a judgment at the end of time when evil will be eliminated. Everything that can't be redeemed will be destroyed. Revelation 20, along with many other chapters, describe this well. But there is a also a judgment for those who can be ultimately redeemed but who also need a little cleaning up. Paul talks about workers who labored for God but with shoddy workmanship; their desires and intentions weren't always noble. Paul says, they will be saved but as through a fire (1 Cor. 3.15).
Again, both of these examples speak of God's love. Because of God's love for creation, evil must be dealt with. Doctors will often have to use invasive measures to heal a patient. They do this out of compassion. So it is with God.
All of this should help us understand better the work of the cross. In Romans we learn the "wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and wickedness of those who by their wickedness suppress the truth" (Romans 1.18). But there is hope: "they [Jew and Gentile] are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a sacrifice of atonement by his blood, effective through faith" (Romans 3.25). In the cross, love and judgment come together. God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself (2 Cor. 5). God absorbed the evil of the world in order to defeat it. The judge submitted to his own judgment to release us from the bondage of sin and death--God embraced his own wrath in Christ through the cross. For it is in the cross that God judged sin and wickedness, and he also set the sinner free.
Our response? It's simple: Receive his grace and walk in the light as he is in the light (1 John 1); become a participant in God's new creation made available to you through Christ (2 Cor. 5).
Peace.
6 comments:
Amen David!
I have been reading Deu 32:1 through 32:52 and have discoverd a wonderous painting. It appears as a primitive story board for our understanding but displays in its brush strokes "all the words" Deu 32:46 the dynamic genious and care of it's artist, the hand of God, regarding "the apple of his eye", "For the LORD's portion is his people, Jacob his alloted heritage". The tapestry of strokes,his scripture, actually are a song! which Moses recited all the words in the hearing of the people, he and Joshua the son of Nun. Deu 32:45.
From the beginning of this chapter to the very end gives one of the best pictures even explanations of the nature and character of God Almighty. The full range (balance) of his Mercy and Judgment, a two edged sword if you will, (even his every word) to work for good and to execute justice and judgment but everything being crowned by His Love for our Redemption through His Son our blessed Redeemer Jesus The Christ.
Lord let us, who are called by they name, be ever mindful and grateful of the Rock of Our Salvation! Amen.
Ever keep us good shepherd as "the apple of your eye" until All Israel be Redeemed from his iniquity! Amen.
Imagine, Jeshurun, The Lord's own his endeared beloved ones, his "pet" whom he aspired to being upright ones! How the Lord alone did lead him, and there was no foreign god with him. Deu 32:15 But Jeshurun waxed fat, and kicked; you waxed fat, you grew thick, you became sleek; then he forsook God who made him, and scoffed at the Rock of his salvation. Deu 32:16 They stirred him to jealousy with strange gods; with abominable practices they provoked him to anger.
The Judgment of God, unlike his enemies, is not spiteful or revengeful or animated without reason or stirred up by decietful rumors inventing falshoods evoking wilful misinterpretation of facts mocking Truth, Justice, or The Way!
For when God reveals his terrible judgment Deu 32:20 through Deu 32:25 he stops short of declairing in Deu 32:26 that he would annihilate the memory of them making a full end of them. However, Praise The Lord, He says in Deu 32:27 had I not feared provocation by the enemy, lest their(Jeshurun's)adversaries should judge amiss, lest they should say, "Our hand is triumphant, the LORD has not wrought all this". Continue reading 32:28 through 32:35 (the enemy falsly ascribes the intent, the action, the method, the word, the judgment of God Almighty)
Deu 32:36 For the LORD will vindicate his people and have compassion on his servants, when he sees that their power is gone, and there is none remaining, bond or free. (TAP OUT!) I repent Lord!
Deu 32:37-38 God chides and mocks Israel for their wanton Idol worship. "Let them rise up and help you, let them be your protection!" Deu 32:39 "See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god beside me; I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; and there is none that can deliver out of my hand."
Thank you Lord for being Just, in your Judgment.
Thank you Lord for being slow to anger but steadfast in Truth.
Lead us Lord in all our ways, and teather us to you light and life, keeping our hearts always anchored in Thee.
(typo) Deu 32:28 through Deu 32:35 should be Deu 32:28 through Deu 32:33
The Grand Finale
Deu 32:4 He is the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is he.
Deu 32:43 Rejoice, O ye nations, with his people: for he will avenge the blood of his servants, and will render vengeance to his adversaries, and will be merciful unto his land, and to his people.
AMEN
Have you ever had a "tune" that gets stuck in your head and won't let you go? Well, this "Judgment" theme Pastor David launched two weeks ago, has been in a good way "pestering" me. It's almost like the tar baby experience that brear Rabbit went through. Thank you Lord!
What I am finding in my wrestling with the Character of God and His Judgment is personally very humbling and too perfect in it's nature to fully appreciate or uncover or adequately reveal on this side of Heaven. The paint (pigment composition) that is blended in the matrix of Judgment's brush strokes has his Love, Grace, Mercy, Goodness, Anger, Vengence, Severity, Redemption, Omnipresence, Omnipotence, Omnicience, etc... and are bigger and more comprehensive than words(human language) can explaine.
Rom 11:33 O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out!
ie. Just some qick thoughts/images/brush stokes to consider: King David and his unblemished love for his son Absalom . For lack of fear,how the natural branches of Israel are cut off (to provoke them to jealousy) and wild ones (gentiles) are grafted in with a warning not to boast over the natural branches (but to fear him) whom God is able to graft back the natural into his fold. The prodigal son who was lost but received by his father from the dead with rejoicing.
Multitudinous in number and Complex in Scope and Revelation!
Bread of Life and Liberty from sin, keep us hungry within, and fill us to overflowing, to be a blessing to those who hunger and thirst after righteousness in our community.
Great words, Scott. Keep up the search. I really like your use of Romans 11.30.
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