One day, a man saw a boy drowning in a river. He dived in and saved the boy's life. After a few months, the boy commited a crime and had to go to court. Once he stepped into the court, he immediately recognized the judge. He said to the judge, "Hi Your honor, remember me?! You saved me the other day! You're my savior! Save me just once more.. Have some mercy on me." And the judge replied, "I was your savior the other day, but today, I am your judge and I have to do what I have to do."
Sounds scary huh? But I thought about it and it made alot of sense to me. It's not that God is schizophrenic and suddenly changes from a nice, warm, kind and merciful God into some evil destroyer who hates his people. It says in His word that He never changes. So He must be the same right?
Have you ever felt mistreated, treated unfairly or accused? Where at those points you can't wait for the evil to be exposed and oh, how you longed for justice! And in those moments you pick up your bible and suddenly you become so happy when you find verses that state that the evil will be destroyed and that God will bring the judgement upon the unjust one day? I don't know about you, but I have had such moments. We want justice when we are unfairly treated. We want justice when there's injustice done toward us. We want God to be the judge... for those people.
But why is it that when we hear that God will judge us for our wrongdoings too (if we do not confess) we get the impression that "God-is-ruthless and not merciful"? Is it that God has changed? Or what? The simple fact is that God is just. He is just like the judge in the story. He needs to do what He has to do, cos He cannot let injustice rule. Yes, He might want to take pity on the boy, save him but He can't anymore. Simply cos when you are the judge, you've to uphold justice!
You might say, "Then everyone'd go to hell since nobody's perfect and have sin right?" Thank God for He has sent His son to pay the price for our sins.
"For God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten son, so that whoever believes in Him shall not perish and have eternal life." John 3:16
I memerized this verse since I was a kid and sometimes I feel like I know it so well that I tend to overlook it? But today, God sorta gave me a new insight on this verse. "For God so loved the world..." He loves you so so so much. "that He gave his only begotten son to die for our sins" We can see God's character from this. He's holy and just. God knows that there's gotta be justice, thus, punishment for all who sinned. It's just like a good parent. He loves his child so so so much, but if his child has commited murder, the child has to face the death sentence cos in actual fact, the child has killed someone and there needs to be justice. Someone has to take that jail term and punishment.
He is a just God but at the same time, He loves you so much that He was willing to send Jesus to die and pay the ransom for your sins." So that no one would perish but have eternal life" This phrase also implies that if there was no Jesus, we're all gonna perish and won't have eternal life. Yep, so He who had completely no sin, was made sin so that we can be accepted into the kingdom of heaven, which is holy. God wants to be with us so badly but He knows that if there's no one paying the ransom for us, we will be separated from Him cos it is what He has to do!
But too many times, we focus on the grace and love of God that we forget that in this verse, God is showing us that He is a just God too! I used to think "Why God is so mean in the old testament and nice in the new testament?" But I think I've finally understood. That God's character has never changed. The difference was that there was no sacrifice/ anyone to pay for the people's sins in the old testament but Jesus was sent for us all, that now, though God is still just, He does not look at what we've done but He looks at us as people who are covered by the blood of Jesus when we confess our sins unto Him. "His thoughts toward us are holy..." That blows my mind!
When we confess our sins now, our sins are washed with the blood of christ, are erased and forgotten. But yes, Jesus is coming back very very soon. And when He comes back to take us back to where we belong, He has to become that judge. And we must account for everything we've done and not confessed. But just like the judge in the story, once the judge sits in the court, there will be no more mercy left. Cos our God is afterall a just God. But that's what we want too isn't it? If God wasn't just... why would I wanna serve an unjust and corrupted authority?
I don't know too much but here's just my two cents worth on this subject (: There are so many things that I've yet to learn and discover... But I'm really thankful for this CGS thingy. Cos just last week, I was so terribly confused with all these. It's really awesome how God turns things around for His glory all the time. Just like how He turned my confusion into conviction... when I decided to ask Him to give me more wisdom and understanding on this. Ahhh, God you're just so wonderful (:
No comments:
Post a Comment