“JUDGEMENT” What an ominous title and weighty subject for a blog post, particularly when it will be focused on God’s judgement, His judicial determination of mankind’s guilt in regard to our transgression of His righteous laws and commandments and the subsequent execution of His prescribed penalty for such transgression which is death, our being cut off from the glorious life with God for which we were created, forever (Genesis 2:16-17) (Ezekiel 18:4) (Revelation 21:8).
However, as I noted in a previous post, our understanding of the justness, severity and certainty of God’s judgement on our sin, on our audacious rejection of His purpose for and rule over our lives as our creator, is essential to our understanding and embracing with great joy, praise and thanksgiving, the Gospel, the good news of what God has done in the person and work of Jesus Christ, God the Son, to justly save sinners from His judgement, such that those who by faith receive this salvation will glorify God for His mercy and enjoy the riches of His grace, forever (John 3:16) (Romans 15:9) (Ephesians 1:6-9) (Ephesians 2:4-7).
The eternal God, the creator, the sovereign king, the lawgiver and rightful judge of His image bearers has judged all of mankind to be guilty of sin, of transgressing His just laws and commandments, living contrary to His righteous nature and character, opposing His design and order for human flourishing and happiness and thus rejecting the very purpose for which we were created – His glory (Isaiah 43:7) (Romans 3:23) (Romans 3:9-18) (1 John 3:4) (Isaiah 33:22).
God’s judgement is indisputable and His verdict right and just (Psalm 9:7-8) (Psalm 51:4) (Genesis 18:25). It is so because it is not a verdict that was determined by hearsay or by disputed testimony, circumstantial evidence or judicial prejudice. It is a verdict based on eyewitness testimony, in this case the testimony of God Himself, the very one who possesses complete knowledge of every detail of our lives. He sees all of our actions, hears all of our words and knows perfectly the motivations of our heart in all that we say and do (Jeremiah 16:16-17) (Jeremiah 17:9-10) (Matthew 12:36) (1 Chronicles 28:9) (Psalm 139:1-12).
God, as lawgiver, determined from the beginning that death, the forfeiture of the glorious life with God for which we were created, a penalty that has its ultimate and final expression in our consignment to the torments of an eternal Hell, would be the just penalty for sin – a penalty He deemed most vindicating of His glory, which mankind has despised and disdained in our ungodly and unrighteous living (Romans 1:18-32). In Hell, we will join the devil and the rebel angels who were the first to disdain, despise and reject God and his rule over their lives (Matthew 25:41).
We cannot begin to understand, acknowledge and glorify God for the justness of this severe penalty unless we first understand sin and God’s infinite hatred of it (Psalm 5:5) (Psalm 11:5) (Proverbs 6:16-19). First and foremost, sin embodies everything contrary to God’s holiness (Isaiah 6:1-6). Sin denies the righteousness of God, denigrates the majesty of God, presumes upon the goodness of God and slanders the glory of God.
Secondly, every one of our transgressions of God’s righteous laws and commandments declares God to be irrelevant, inconsequential and unnecessary to our happiness and well-being. In rejecting and rebelling against God’s will and plan for human flourishing and individual happiness and replacing it with our own, we have brought nothing but pain, sorrow, suffering, misery, conflict, corruption and death into His good and perfect creation (Genesis 1:31). Thus, God would not be good, He would not be just, and He certainly would not be loving if He allowed such opposition and rebellion to continue with impunity.
Thus, God’s wrath, His personal expression of His hatred of and judgment on sin, is a sure and fearful truth that is clearly presented throughout the Bible and experienced throughout human history in all of the personal tragedies, natural and technological calamities, interpersonal and national conflicts, epidemics and untold miseries that have afflicted the human race since the one man, Adam, brought sin and death into God’s good creation (Hebrews 10:30) (Romans 1:18) (Amos 3:6) (Lamentations 3:38-39) (Romans 5:12-14).
Adam, the federal representative of the human race, along with His wife Eve who were to be progenitors of that race, a race of men and women made in the image and likeness of God, are given dominion over and the freedom to enjoy all of God’s glorious creation (Genesis 1:26-28). Given one law, one commandment to test their allegiance to and trust in God, they violate that law, ignoring God’s initial warning of death for disobedience and thus join the devil in his treasonous rebellion against God (Genesis 3:1-7) (John 8:44).
They immediately come under judgement, wherein the glorious image of God in man’s body and soul are corrupted and their relationship with God and one another estranged (Genesis 3:8-13). They and their progeny (us) will no longer image the righteous nature and character of the God who created them, but of the one whose word Adam believed over God’s, namely the devil (Ecclesiastes 7:29) (John 8:42-44). Our physical bodies, now made mortal and corrupted by sin, will eventually fade into old age, cease to function and return to the earth from which God formed them (Genesis 3:19).
Adam and Eve are thus exiled from Eden, cut off from the glorious life with God for which man was created wherein they had experienced all of the joys and diverse pleasures of intimate communion with God (Genesis 3:23-24) (Psalm 16:11).
They and their progeny (us) will now live in a world cursed by God and where the one whose word they believed over God’s, namely the devil, will have great influence (Genesis 3:17-19) (1 John 5:19). Instead of blessing man as God initially intended, the earth and all that is in it would oppose man, just as man opposes God. Everything, from the ground from which we would get our food, to the weather, to all living creatures – from the tiniest virus to all of the species in the animal kingdom will exist at enmity with man, as man is at enmity with God (Romans 8:7).
Yet in the midst of His unrelenting judgement, God, who is a God of both justice and mercy (Psalm 89:14) (Isaiah 54:7), promises to one day graciously redeem and restore both man and creation back to the glory, beauty and excellence in which He originally intended (Romans 8:18-25). This will be accomplished by the one revealed in Genesis 3:15 as the seed/offspring of the woman, later known as the seed of Abraham (Genesis 22:18-19) and the Son of David (Matthew 1:1), who we ultimately come to know as Jesus the Christ/Messiah, the Son of the Living God (Matthew 16:15-16), who came into this world 2000 years ago, born the offspring of the woman, Mary, that He may save His people from their sins (Matthew 1:18-21).
In this first coming we are told in John 3:17 that God did not send Jesus to bring final judgement of this sin-condemned world, but to save a people from that judgement, by taking our sins and the judgement for sins upon Himself on the cross, so that all who repent of their sin, trust Him as their all sufficient savior, and submit to Him as Lord, will not perish in Hell, but receive God’s gracious gift of eternal life, the glorious life with God for which man was created (Isaiah 53:4-6) (1 Peter 2:24) (Romans 10:8-11) (John 3:16) (2 Peter 3:9).
We are told however, in multiple scriptures, that there is coming a day when Jesus will return to establish His eternal kingdom to include all who did repent and believe the gospel (1 Timothy 4:1-2) (2 Thessalonians 1:5-9) (Mark 1:14-15).
At that time, He will judge both the living and the dead, wherein the eternal destiny of all mankind will be finally and unchangeably determined (Acts 17:30-31) (Matthew 25:31-46) (Revelation 20:11-14). It is described in Malachi 4:5 as the great and terrible day of the Lord.
And it is this great and terrible day we will begin to look at in my next post. (I dare you to read it).
Grace and Peace ×