Tag: Job

God’s Judgments, Pt. 3 – Commentary

Tragically, God’s patience and reluctance to punish is too often taken as tolerance or even indifference toward the sins even those that name Christ’s name might practice. However, when it comes to sin, God has no favorites. The apostle Paul warns those in churches against living evil lives, that if they do they will not inherit the kingdom. See 1 Cor. 6:10-11; Galatians 5:19-21; Ephesians 5:8 – three witnesses of this. Or a 4th, in Revelation 21:8 at the mouth of the resurrected Jesus. Paul taught in Acts 17 that all men must repent in view of the coming Judgment of Christ at his return. “All men” includes Christians, does it not?

I think it is fitting at the start to speak of the goodness and kindness of God. For it may seem a grievous thing that the severity of God’s judgments fills the Bible so much, but, it is really a good thing. It shows that the Lord is loving enough and patient enough to warn sinners many times before finally acting against them. But God desires that everyone might escape “the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels.”* He had Amos admonish Israel, “Prepare to meet your God.” and had Paul warn his hearers, “But now He commands that all people everywhere should repent, because he has appointed a day in which he will judge the world. . .” If God was unkind or as cruel as his vicious critics blasphemously say of him, he would have kept his wrath to come a secret, leaving man unaware and unprepared for eternity of “weeping and gnashing of teeth in everlasting fire where their worm never dies.” Nor would he have sent His Son to redeem man at the cost of his very life if he was unkind or cruel by nature. * Scriptures in this paper are quoted from World English Bible.

No. It is not God, it is man who is cruel or unkind by nature. As it says in Romans 3, “Their throat is an open tomb. With their tongues they have used deceit. The poison of vipers is under their lips whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood. Destruction and misery are in their ways. The way of peace, they haven’t known. There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

Considering the eternal torments that await the sinner, God’s many warnings and examples of judgment he executed, such as on Sodom and Gomorrah (unbelievers) or on those in the Wilderness He led out of Egypt (his people), shows us how seriously God wants us to fear his judgments for sin. “The Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” David wrote, “My flesh trembles for fear of you. I am afraid of your judgments.” (Ps. 119:120) Jesus gave his own disciples reason to fear God by saying to them, “I tell you, my friends, don’t be afraid of those who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. But I will warn you whom you should fear. Fear him, who after he has killed, has power to cast into Gehenna. Yes, I tell you, fear him. (Luke 12:4-5).

God has not only warned over and over about it, but He has also made available a way of escape. That’s the Gospel message – Turn back to God from evil and put faith in His Son whom He delivered over to death for the offenses that bring His wrath. It is by this that God most demonstrated his love for us. His resurrection ensures that we might also live again as Jesus does. Continue reading “God’s Judgments, Pt. 3 – Commentary”