Tag Archives: freedom

How God can call us righteous (Romans 3:21-31)

In this overview of Paul’s letter to the Romans, we return to what has become the motive for all that Paul does. God is revealing his gift of righteousness[i].

But here, he says it has been revealed. It’s not a human idea—an ideology. It’s been accomplished by God, through Christ, and all this before it is announced to us. God has sent Jesus to change how things stand between him and us.

As we’ve noticed, the human race is in trouble. God’s wrath is already working out in our history. Or, it is being stored up because our good deeds are a cover rather than an expression of who we are. But Paul is eager to tell us about God’s salvation—salvation from his wrath. He’s eager to see us reconciled to God.

Paul uses three words, well known in his world, to describe what God accomplishes for us through Jesus—particularly through his death and resurrection. And with each word, we are taken a little deeper into what has happened.

First, we are ‘justified by God’s grace as a gift’.

To be justified, in the way Paul uses this word, is to hear a judge declare in court that we are righteous. No charge remains against us.

On judgement day at the end of history, everyone will have to answer to their Maker[ii]. But here, that final judgement is being announced in advance. The Judge of all the earth says we are righteous!

Paul calls this God’s righteousness because that’s where it comes from. But it’s an announcement about us. He’s giving a status of righteous to us who trust his Son[iii]. And it’s a kindness being shown to us, not what we deserve.

All of this is being given to us because of our Lord Jesus. He is the one who does everything he is asked to do. He is the one who knows we need a saviour. God looks at his Son and all that he does for us, and is satisfied. He loves his Son for doing all that he has asked[iv].

But God also looks at us who are trusting his Son and are looking to him for our righteousness—and he finds nothing in us to condemn. In God’s presence, we are righteous.

Only an authoritative judgement like this can persuade us to give up our hollow boasting about our goodness. But there is more. This announcement is more than words.

Paul’s second word is redemption.

This is what would happen in a slave market. If someone pays for a slave and sets him free, he is said to be redeemed. It’s also what happens when Moses leads Israel out of slavery in Egypt and into freedom in their own land.

Paul says we have redemption that comes to us in Christ Jesus.

You may recall Jesus saying that he had come to offer himself as a ransom for many[v]. A ransom is the price paid to buy and release a slave. If we are to be set free, it must happen because of what happens to Jesus first. He buys our redemption with his blood[vi].

Everyone who sins is a slave. It’s easy to see that we can become slaves to bad habits. But there’s more to our slavery than that. We carry our failures with us—as guilt. And our accuser has evidence that we belong to him—and he reminds us of it. We lose our nerve[vii].

The world then seems a more attractive home for us than the Father we’ve offended. And, all the while, God’s judgement, and death, loom over us. We are far from free. And then, we get so accustomed to suppressing all this that we don’t really see what redemption is until God shows it to us.

Are we living freely, graciously and boldly? Or are we imagining our freedom and timidly serving ourselves? My eager prayer is that all of us will see the graciousness of God in giving us his Son for this purpose. And that we will receive his redemption as a gift!

The third word Paul uses is propitiation or sacrifice of atonement. This is what happens when a Jewish priest offers up a sacrificial lamb or other animal as a sin offering.

The order prescribed for Israel’s sin offerings is very helpful. The worshipper places their hands on an animal’s head and confesses their sins. They then kill the animal and offer it to God on an altar. The imagery could not be clearer. The one who bears the sin is the one who should die. But here, God says, your sins are transferred to the animal, and it dies in your place.

But now, God presents Jesus to the whole world as a propitiation[viii]. Until this point, God has effectively been passing over sins—awaiting, of course, this coming of his Son.

In our case, Jesus is our sacrificial Lamb[ix]. He diverts God’s wrath from us by bearing it himself.

Only this can explain the awful death Jesus dies. In the same way that God gives godless people up to the consequences of their sins[x], he gives up his Son to the sins of the whole world, and to the wrath that rightly falls on such evil[xi].

God does not fix us up by sweeping our godlessness under his carpet—like a worrisome remnant of dirt. Rather, he shows us what he means by righteousness, not by ignoring our hostility to him, but by exposing its vileness and providing an atoning sacrifice.

Here is the love that has been shown to us. Our sins are lifted from us, and the shame of them, and the penalty they deserve. And when Jesus has borne them, and the Father receives his offering, there is no sin or shame or penalty remaining towards ourselves[xii].

So, to sum up, being justified is not just God making out we’re lovable when we are not. Redemption is not just God setting us free because he’s strong enough to do so. There’s a price to pay. And propitiation is not just cleaning us up so there’s nothing objectionable in us anymore. It’s Jesus bearing our sins in his body, bearing God’s curse on that sin.

When Jesus is about to die, he asks for some water, and then says, ‘It is finished!’[xiii] This may be the loud cry that Mark reports[xiv]. Jesus wants us to know that we have been accounted for, that we are free to live truly, and that we are called righteous by God.

Notice that in these eleven verses we are looking at, Paul talks about faith or believing nine times. He doesn’t just want to tell us about Jesus. He wants us to trust him.

If we want God’s righteousness, we’ll need to trust in him and rely on the redemption Christ has accomplished. We need this to be clear because we defend our own righteousness with everything we’ve got—vainly, of course, because we have to go on doing it.

But Paul has shown how comprehensive and final this God-righteousness is. But he’s got one more bubble to burst. He still has some Jewish readers who boast in God and the law. They need to learn from Abraham how to live by what God promises rather than what they can perform.

[i] Rom. 1:17

[ii] Rom. 2:5

[iii] ‘Justify’ is the verbal form of ‘righteousness’—dikaio and dikaiosune.

[iv] John 10:17

[v] Matt. 20:28

[vi] Rom. 5:9

[vii] Prov. 28:1

[viii] 1 John 2:2

[ix] John 1:29

[x] Rom. 1:24, 26, 28

[xi] Rom. 4:25; 8:32

[xii] Heb. 9:14, 26; 10:5-14, 22

[xiii] John 19:30

[xiv] Mark 15:36-37

‘Dead to the law’. What does this mean? (Rom. 7)

We’ve been looking at the new freedoms Christ has won for us in his death and resurrection. He’s saved us from the death we deserve, and we now have eternal life (Romans 5). And he’s saved us from the sin we were mastered by, so that we are no longer burdened with its guilt or control (Romans 6).

But what about being released from God’s law? In the seventh chapter of Romans, this is what Paul now turns to. If we are going to live for God, it’s vital that we are no longer under the power of his law.

What can this mean? It actually sounds wrong.

The answer comes in three parts. This isn’t so much because the subject is complex. It’s because we are!

Knowing what God says about right and wrong does some strange things to us. We can be proud of what we know, or depend on it, even while breaking it—as Paul has said the Jews did.[i] Or, we can resent and react to it, and even blame it—as everyone does if they are not at peace with God.[ii] And then, even when we are reconciled to God and love his law, our behaviour seems to have a will of its own so that we struggle with what God wants of us.

Each of these issues is addressed in this passage.

First, those who depend on the law should understand what Christ has done for them, and to them[iii].

Our obligation to law as a regime[iv] has needed to die—and has died, because we are included in Christ’s dying and rising. Paul’s ‘don’t you know’ highlights our tendency to miss this point.

Paul uses marriage as an illustration. It lasts as long as both parties are alive. But not after that. So, Paul argues, if we have died—with Christ—our earlier ‘marriage’ to law is finished. We can’t have Christ and still be ‘married’ to law.

Jews should have understood this—not just the illustration of marriage but what it refers to. Jesus comes among them and shows that they have not been keeping the law they are so fond of. And he is establishing a new regime. But they don’t understand this—or won’t. And they murder Jesus for standing between them and their law.

But it’s not just Jews who have this problem. All of us can elevate our culture and practices—even our Christian culture and practices—to an absolute. We become legalists who judge everything and everyone by our standard. We’re starting with what comes from God—his law—but actually living by what comes from us—our ‘flesh’.[v]

We need to see that Christ has died for our sins. Yes! But we also need to see that he has died to release us from ourselves and our proud notion that we may be able to please God by fulfilling some code of behaviour.

The tragedy of being under the law in this way is not just that it bypasses Christ’s work on the cross, but that it doesn’t yield any fruit for God. It’s sterile. It arouses our flesh, not subdues it.[vi] It imprisons us. And it ends in death, not life. In plain terms, we’re either going to accept we are dead to law because we’re trusting Christ, or, accept the death penalty ourselves!

We need to look again at what Jesus has done on the cross—to release us from this bondage! And need to see that the Spirit now conveys to us all the liberty and joy that will fulfil the law!

Second, those who blame the law, or dismiss it, don’t yet understand themselves.

Can we blame the law for our problems? Imagine arguing that God gets it wrong when he announces his requirements from Mount Sinai! It’s certainly the mindset of our present world—restrictions cause reaction, so don’t make any restrictions!

But, of course, we all have problems with law. Our problem is that we don’t get to write it! Or change it! Or avoid it! We want to be in charge.

But God’s law defines what sin is, and what righteousness is. And especially, as Paul says here, it includes not only what we are to do but what we want—‘you shall not covet what is your neighbour’s’. To covet is simply to long for all the other things prohibited by the other commands.

The law is not bad because it condemns us. It awakens us to what we really are. We all tend to think what we do is good—until forced to admit our faults. And law does this work. It reveals the worst in us.

This is personal, and, for the first time since the start of the letter, Paul refers to himself. This business of law is not an academic matter.

Does Paul have a particular crisis in mind? Of course, we don’t know. But we know that Paul feels this point personally. He’s speaking about the past, when he isn’t a Christian.

He wants the law to approve him—like the rich young ruler who comes to Jesus[vii]. But God says, ‘Don’t covet’. A law like this can’t approve him. It condemns him. Is this the crisis that Jesus refers to when he says to Saul of Tarsus outside Damascus, ‘It is hard for you…’ (Acts).

But God’s law is not the problem. It’s holy, righteous and good. Rather, the problem is our sin—sin so deep that it ends in death. This is what we need to see—that sin really is sinful. It is ‘sinful beyond measure’. When we do wrong, God is offended.

It’s hard to convey how necessary this point is. We are inclined to think well of ourselves, even while confessing our sins. And the sadness of this is, not just that we can’t see who we truly are, but that we don’t know how much we need Jesus.

Third, those who love the law will always be in a battle.

Paul speaks to us personally again, but now, in the present tense. He speaks to us as one Christian to another.

And this is how we can now think about the law. It’s ‘spiritual’—suggesting that it’s from God, that we can’t get our hands on it and that it does what God wants it to do. It’s good. And, with all our heart, it’s what we want to do.[viii]

But where has this understanding and this desire come from? It’s the new heart God has given us, as he told Jeremiah[ix]. It’s the new covenant that Jesus enacted by the spilling of his blood.[x] The law has been written on our hearts—not just on stone tablets.[xi] We know God. And love him. And in loving him, we want to do his will.

A law that’s above us—as something to reach, kills us[xii]. On the other hand, a law that’s written on our hearts and a Spirit that’s given to dwell in us produces fruit. And this fruit breaks no law.[xiii]

But then, how shall we understand our wrong desires and lapses? These suggest we are ‘sold under sin’ (v. 14), that, in fact we are still slaves and not free at all (v. 23). It makes us feel wretched (v. 24).

Notice how Paul uses ‘I’ in this passage. He says ‘I’ do what ‘I’ don’t want to do. Is he a hopelessly divided personality? Far from it. There is an ‘I’ in Christ, but also, an ‘I’ described as flesh constantly asserting itself. But he, and we, are always one person. The difference is a difference of relation—we know and respond to God, but we also know and respond to the world that has rejected God.

It’s the actions of this latter ‘I’ that are troubling. Sin is close (v. 21) but it’s not our ‘inner being’ (v. 22).

Paul feels this so strongly that he says it is not ‘I’ who do the wrong. It’s sin in me. He’s learned that the ‘I’ who is in Christ is secure. He can look on wrong done as something apart from his real person. His identity is secure. His behavior is the problem.

Anyone who thinks they have conquered their propensity to sin is deceiving themselves. On the other hand, everyone who trusts in Christ has a security more powerful than the greatest of failures. We will endure. And we will be ‘delivered from this body of death’.

This subject continues when we come to look at the next chapter. But we’ve come to some conclusions. First, God’s dos and don’ts are good. We can be thankful for them. And second, we are not good, and we need to run to Christ. And third, we can’t fudge our way through life by pretending we are innocent and harmless. We have to struggle.

[i] Rom 2:23

[ii] Rom. 7:5

[iii] Vv. 1-6

[iv] A governance that can approve or condemn us.

[v] Gal. 3:3-14

[vi] As in 2:17-24

[vii] Mark 10:17-20

[viii] Some think this section describes a pre-Christian experience, but the affirmations about the law suggest that this is a person who loves God and is part of his new covenant.

[ix] Jer. 31:31-34

[x] Luke 22:20

[xi] 2 Cor. 3:6-8

[xii] Cf. Deut. 30:11-14

[xiii] Gal. 5:22-23

Let mercy reign (Rom. 12)

Paul is greatly moved when he finishes taking about God’s mercy. And so should we all be! Jesus has shown us how God goes about being kind to those who hate him. And this has introduced a whole new era.

So now, we all need a new life-style to match, and Paul pleads with us to have a life where God’s mercy shapes how we think, what we do and what we trust (12:1-2).

I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but the world—or, literally, ‘the age’ we live in is very confining. We are expected to behave and believe and approve as others do—or be excluded.  It’s God who sets us free from these constrictions and enlarges our horizons.

The ‘age’ to which Paul refers is not a particular decade but all the time between the coming of Jesus and his coming again. In other words, now.

So, our thinking needs to change. God, the Lord of the universe, is being merciful—to me! I don’t need to hang onto my guilts or resentments or selfish ambitions. I’m free to live in the flow of God’s largesse. Has this really broken into our thinking?

Paul is now able to develop something he said earlier. We used to be slaves to our sins, but have now been entrusted to a new and powerful gospel. This will change the way we look at things, and our living.[i] This may sound risky, but it’s liberating. We will be giving to others what God is giving to us.

And the sacrifice this will involve will not be to placate an angry God—or an angry world for that matter. And we won’t need to ‘kill ourselves’ doing it. We offer ourselves as a ‘living sacrifice’, simply giving our lives over to Christ’s new regime—mercy. Well then, how should we live?

It’s interesting to see where Paul begins—with egotism (12:3-8).

We’ve all got things we can do, and especially so when we’ve been set free. God gives us gifts—a range of capabilities to help us help each other. But if we forget mercy, these things can make us proud.

Rather, we need to forget about being great and to check how closely our works reflect what we are believing—our ‘measure of faith’. And we need to forget about how much control it enables us to have and to think about how much it helps the whole group to be strong and useful.

And then, Paul gives us a lovely list of alerts—or commands. These may well stop us in our tracks when we realise we are living according to our old way of life, and that we need a new line of action, or a new habit (12:9-13).

Loving is a good place to start.

Paul is not talking about love defined by the present age—often little more than giving people what they want. I call this ‘lazy love’. It’s harder to discern what a person really needs and to look out for ways to give them that. We need to reflect God’s loving, which, as we have seen, can sometimes be kindness, and sometimes severity.[ii] Whatever, it needs to be genuine.

And, given that we are now part of God’s new age, our sense of good and evil also needs to change.

The world shapes our moral compass by its culture and ideology. But now, our affections and conscience must be reformed by seeing what evil does to Jesus, and by the goodness with which he responds.

We look at the things that kill Christ. They are the things to hate and to run from. And we look at the way Jesus responds. Here is the power that will reign in the age to come, and the power that will begin to change this present world. These are the things to love.

Paul’s check list continues with eagerness, joy, patience, prayer and generosity. If I mention the opposites of these, we may see how much we need a constant flow of God’s mercy!

For example, are we dull in our affections, morbid with our problems, anxious about the number of things that should be done or threats to our safety, or afraid of meeting people with great needs?

It’s time to get our minds full, again and again, of God’s great mercy—to us. He is full of affection. He rejoices over us with singing.[iii] He is slow to get angry. He has not spared his own Son; will he not then freely give us all needful things?[iv]

We need to do what Mary did when she was told she would be the mother of the Son of God—‘Let it be to me according to your word’.[v] When she prayed this prayer, the Holy Spirit caused a new life to be formed in her womb. In another sense, we can ask for Christ to be formed in us[vi]. And God will see to it that we are transformed—transformed by his mercy.

And what about living in a world that doesn’t appreciate ‘where we are coming from’ (12:14-21)?

This is a very helpful list to have because most of us spend our time among people who don’t know God—and don’t want to.

We can show what our God is like by our good will for nasty people, sympathy with everyone, friendship with people without our privileges, respect for the opinions of others and kindness for people who hate us. How come? God is being good to us! And God wants to show his goodness to others. We’re just imitating our Saviour! And we’re leaving him to deal with what is not given to us to fix.

We are called to overcome evil with good, like Jesus did the day he died for our sins. It won’t look like it’s working—not yet. But it will.

[i] Rom. 6:17

[ii] Rom. 11:22

[iii] Zeph. 3:17

[iv] Rom. 8:32

[v] Luke 1:38

[vi] Gal. 4:19

[i] Rom. 6:17

[ii] Rom. 11:22

[iii] Zeph. 3:17

[iv] Rom. 8:32

[v] Luke 1:38

[vi] Gal. 4:19

Freedom—lost and won

Jesus tells us the purpose of his coming is to ‘proclaim freedom for the prisoners’ (Luke 4:18). He’s reading Isaiah 61 to his local synagogue, and he says this is what he is going to do.

Given our thirst for freedom, we need to know what Jesus has in mind.

Ideologies, and this world’s crusaders, say they know what will give us freedom but they all miss what is really needed. Jesus is clear: ‘whoever commits sin is a slave to it’ (John 8:31-36).

Here’s our problem. Freedom must be freedom to be what we really are. We’re made by God and if we’re fighting him, we’re already trapped—and can be seduced by many other so-called freedoms the world says will fix us.

Most of the social freedoms we enjoy have come from ordinary people fighting for them. But this freedom comes from above. It must be provided by God, and it comes with a cost. It’s called ‘redemption’ which means setting people free by paying a price.

Shortly before he dies, Jesus talks about what he is going to happen with Moses and Elijah. They discuss the ‘departure’ he will accomplish in Jerusalem (Luke 9:31). The word is actually ‘exodus’. Jesus, like Moses, is going to lead his people in a great victory and give freedom to his people (cf. Exodus 7:16). It will be freedom from sin. And it will be freedom to serve God.

This is what Jesus does when he dies on the cross. He describes what is going to happen as the hour belonging to his enemies, and when darkness reigns (Luke 22:53). He’s not fooled by how hard—or costly—freeing us from our sins is going to be.

Jesus overcomes our sin by becoming our sin (2 Corinthians 5:21). I don’t know how this happens, by I know it is an amazing work of love.

He personally engages what binds us. He bears sin’s futility, its pollution and shame. He owns our liability before God, and the judgement it deserves. And he dies.

But notice, Jesus has also said that Satan is coming. But Satan has nothing to hold him (John 14:30-31). Anything Satan throws at him can be overcome. If you like, Jesus dies as a free man. He’s there to do his Father’s will.

So, Jesus sets us free, by spilling his blood. He’s redeemed us. Here’s how the apostles talk about this.

First, we are forgiven (Eph. 1:7).

This becomes very practical when the gospel is first preached. The apostles announce forgiveness to Christ’s murderers (Acts 2:38). The relief of this is felt deeply and noticeably. These Jews are in big trouble with God, and in moment, they are entirely free of guilt. Their relief before God pours out in an overflowing of generosity to one another.

Guilt is awful! It binds us up in self-justification, self-promotion, self-excusing and busyness. But Christ loves us. Not just when he dies, but now. And he releases us from our sin by his blood (Rev. 1:5).

This means we are released from a life driven by the need to ‘be someone’, or to keep God off our back (Acts 13:39; Rom. 8:1-4; Gal. 4:3-5). A lot of what we do is not because it’s useful, or kind, but because it puts us in a good light, or simply, relieves our conscience. We’re still slaves—not free!

We really need to ask ourselves, often, ‘Is my life starting with guilt or forgiveness?’

Second, we are cleansed.

Think of Peter when Jesus starts to wash the feet of his disciples (John 13:2-10). One minute he doesn’t want his feet washed. Next he wants a complete bath! He’s trying to show he’s in charge, but he’s making a fool of himself.

And Jesus says, ‘You are clean!’ Later, he adds, ‘You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you’ (John 15:3).

Peter needs to find a new way of seeing himself. He is clean—because of Christ’s word. Later, Peter must also find a new way of seeing others (Acts 15:9).

Israel has been told to cleanse themselves from defilement—to ‘circumcise their hearts’ (Deut. 10:16). They won’t do this—not as a nation. So, God will do it for them (Deut. 30:6).

This is what happens when Christ dies (Col. 2:11-14). What is unclean in us is attributed to him, and, in his flesh, it’s cut off. Because we are joined to Christ by faith, we also are clean—and able to enjoy God.

Christ washes his whole church to make her pure—as a bride for himself (Eph. 5:26).

Third, we have a change of master.

When someone trusts in Christ, they are transferred to his kingdom. He’s in charge of the arena we now live in (Col. 1:13-14). This has some amazing consequences

What we used to be—our old humanity—is no longer in charge (Rom. 6:6-7). God has joined us to Christ’s death and resurrection, so our ‘body of sin’ is disabled. Being freed is actually being ‘justified’. Where the guilt of our sin is removed, its power is decisively broken. Notice, Paul at this point is not talking about how we are to behave but what we are to count on (Romans 6:11).

So, sin is no longer in charge (Rom. 6:15-23). We really want God’s good news, and part of this is that we want a new life—living for God. This is not our goal. It needs to be our starting point—all of the time.

If there is no cross where Jesus dies, freedom dies—in a restlessness of guilt, a quagmire of pollution, and a collision of rival powers. But freedom lives and thrives for God’s people because it has pleased him to unite us to his Son, in whom freedom is granted as a gift.

We are free to serve God, and to serve our neighbor. This is what we are created for. Everything is working properly.

Many people have died to preserve freedom for others—a freedom to live in their own chosen way. But Jesus has died to provide true human freedom. And it is free people who can move out into life creating freedom for others—in their families, communities and countries.

How Good it is that God is Judge (3)

This is the third article in a series about God as Judge. I have hoped to show why Christians can savour this truth and in what way. The other two articles are further down in the blog.

What does it mean that God is Judge of the whole world? It’s easy to dismiss this because he doesn’t seem to do anything, and the powers we answer to are more likely to wear wigs, or blue uniforms, and our brush with them has probably been minimal. Then again, our popular teachers say we are our own masters and that the idea of any external arbiter should be dismissed.

I am unlikely to persuade someone that God is Judge if they don’t already believe that Jesus is the world’s Saviour. Our persuading begins with him. He is the way God has explained himself. He explains what he means by judgement by sending his Son in the likeness of our sinful flesh, and as an offering for sin (Romans 8:3). What happens to him and how he receives what happens to him is what God means by judgement. Jesus said, ‘Now is the judgement of this world,’ and he was speaking about his own death (John 12:31). It is this event that gives all that we are saying its moral credibility.

The Apostle Paul had a conversation with a Roman governor, Felix, about faith in Jesus Christ. That was his starting point, but his conversation included, necessarily, ‘righteousness, self-control and judgment to come’, which left Felix frightened, and the discussion ended (Acts 24:24-27). The same thing would probably happen today. But I’m not primarily interested in what modern people are likely to believe but rather, what is true. At the end of the day, that is what is going to matter.

In fact, God is always doing what he needs to do to tell us that this world is his. When the gospel is being preached, he is revealing his righteousness—the true way of being right before God. Paul puts this in the present tense because God is revealing himself, and revealing how to relate to him, by having his servants preach the gospel. At the same time Paul says God is revealing his wrath (Romans 1:16-18). How this happens may seem surprising, and, I suspect, is often misunderstood.

Paul lists a number of things that are going wrong with his first century world, a list not too different from one we may compile for our own century. But he is not telling us that these things are wrong. He assumes we know that. He is saying that when people do these things, God is revealing his wrath—to them and to the world at large. The sin in this passage is not bad behaviour but repressing what God is revealing about himself. So when people do whatever they like, give way to lusts, degrading passions including homosexuality, depraved minds, wickedness, greed, murder, strife, deceit, malice, gossip, slander, insolence, boasting, untrustworthiness, lack of mercy, and pride in doing these things, God is revealing his wrath. People don’t just do these things, they can’t help doing them because God has given them up to them. This means that the very people who think there is no God to assess or reward their actions are actually in the hands of God.

Contrary to popular belief, God is not naturally angry but is provoked to anger by those who live their life as though he were not around. He is jealous for the affection and obedience of the creatures he has formed. He wants to give himself to them and to give them a full life. When he gives us up to our own choices, it is as though Christ himself is saying, as he said to Paul earlier, ‘It is hard for you to kick against the goads’ (Acts 26:14).

Paul’s letter is written to Christians and it is we who need to know how God acts as Judge. If we take judgement into our hands, we get it wrong. Wrath is God’s affair, not ours, but he is doing what is right in regard to people who ignore him. Our task is to be witnesses to Jesus Christ, and, in the context of that revelation of love, to tell people about judgement.

If we know God is gracious, we can see these things. We can see how God gives people over to their sins and to the social consequences of them. The world can’t see its own dilemma. Nor can it see the way God is caring for those who trust him.

The prophet Isaiah refers to this phenomenon (Isa. 26:1-12). He describes God caring for those who honour him and his law and who long for him to intervene in their world. They may be afflicted and helpless (v. 6) but know that God’s hand is ‘lifted up’ (v. 11) to save them. Their path is ‘smooth’ and ‘level’ (v. 7). They have ‘perfect peace’ (v. 3). On the other hand, God’s hand is ‘lifted up’, not only to bless his people but also to be angry with those who ignore him; his judgements are in the land (v. 9). As a result of this, things go wrong, terribly wrong (vv. 5-6). Still, says Isaiah, they can’t see it (vv. 10-11).

I wonder if we can see the parallels to this in our situation. God’s judgements are being revealed in our land. This can be tricky because there is often no direct correlation between evil and suffering. Many people get away with evil for many years and others seem to suffer innocently. But then, there are social consequences of some actions that ought to register as a moral result of actions.Here are some examples.

  • When people give free reign to their passions, they release a euphoria that can’t be sustained. Freedom and good will are eroded by permissiveness because demands for selfish pleasure increase. Peter Lowman has some articles that show Western secular writers over recent centuries confessing that without God, we have no substantial basis for purpose, meaning, ethics or love. You can read them at http://www.bethinking.org/atheism/after-god.
  • In economic terms, we are trying to build a generous economy out of selfish people and it’s not working. Our politicians try their best and speak to us warmly about how we should be able to live but they can’t produce it. And the pie we are trying to share is shrinking. We think capitalism will spread the wealth but it was not designed for that. It was put forward as the best was to generated wealth, not spread it. Only generous people can make a generous economy.
  • Then again, we are trying to make happy families by changing partners, and that’s not working either. Just ask the children affected by this. On a wider scale, we want the nations to behave like a family and be reasonable, but we have no Father God to call us to account and demonstrate tender strength.
  • And again, we are trying to define goodness by majority decisions and are becoming more polarized than united. Is this just because other people are unreasonable? Or is it saying that goodness must be defined by someone greater than us all of us put together?

In many respects, our postulating in the West about knowing what is good for the world sounds to me like the Emperor who paraded naked because he had been persuaded that his invisible ‘clothes’ were beautiful. A young boy in the crowd said, ‘The Emperor’s got no clothes’, not realising he was supposed to make out that the Emperor did have clothes on. The fact is, we are not doing well. This may sound like the naïve cry of someone uninformed about public affairs, but it should be obvious.

These dysfunctional aspects of our way of life are God’s judgement. He loves us too much to let us indulge our fantasies and is speaking to us by being what he is — our Judge. The world may not be willing to acknowledge this. Rather, as someone quipped, we look for ‘a breakthrough a day to keep the crisis at bay’. Something else must be the problem, not us.

It is important for Christians to know these things because they are the background for our announcing the good news of Jesus Christ. Somewhere, there will be people who can no longer be sated with the goodies of this world and who know life cannot proceed without righteousness, not in this life or the next, and they will hear our good news with different ears.

It is important for us Christians to know, also, that God’s hand has been, and is being, ‘lifted up’ in our favour. Have we seen the enormity of Christ rising from the dead to abolish death? Do we know how amazing it is to be forgiven for all our sins and to stand righteous before God, forever? It is easy, when things are going well, to ‘not need’ the favour of God because the world already favours us enough. We slip into thinking God is only interested in the present world and that he doesn’t want to give us any more. Let us remember that his hand is ‘lifted up’, as Judge, in our favour, and nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 8:38-39). That is what we need to know.

We have stood where judgement fell on this world because God sees us as united to Christ in his crucifixion. Judgement fell on us well and truly. We know the fervour of his wrath and the heat of his holiness. Jesus Christ endured its pain, but we know it as a moral power (Rom. 6:4-6; Gal. 2:20; 5:24; 6:14; Col. 3:3-6). We love God for his holiness and for his love in reaching out to us in this way. We see the need for people to know this gracious God and cannot think God unkind when his wrath is revealed. God gives us confidence to stand before him, even when things are tough, and this is evidence, at least to us, that we are being saved. It may also be evidence to some that they are not (Phil. 1:28; 2 Thes. 1:5).

The world’s Saviour is still our Judge. We call on him as Father but should fear him as one who judges impartially (1 Peter. 1:17). Then again, Peter tells us, ‘It is time for judgement to begin with the household of God’ (1 Peter 4:17). He then talks about judgement coming to those who reject the gospel. We have to get the balance right because we will not be convincing to the world about God being Judge if we do not live before him ourselves. All the letters Christ sends to the churches in the book of Revelation (chapters 2 and 3) talk about Christ standing, effectively, as Judge among his people. He speaks about what he has for and against them, what they should do to remedy defects and what he promises to those who hear what the Spirit says to the churches. He does this, not to throw doubt on the salvation of his people but to ensure that the light from his churches burns brightly.

Picking up the exhortations Christ gives in these letters, let us ask ourselves these questions. Do we love Christ fervently, endure under trial, hate what he hates and love what he loves, live by his word and trust in his righteousness alone? These are the things Christ watches over us to produce in his church. Those Christ loves he rebukes and chastens.

If we know God is our Judge and that this judging has been entrusted to Christ, we have the proper sense of how our gospel must come to those who don’t know Christ. Paul said, ‘Knowing the fear of God, we persuade others’ (2 Corinthians 5:11-21). Through faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, we have a proper understanding of our responsibility to God, a deep gratefulness for the love of Christ, a due sense of its cost and a hearty enjoyment of our new place in God’s favour. As such, we can say to others, with moral earnestness, ‘Be reconciled to God’. The stakes are high, and the rewards real. It is no fiction to say, ‘How good it is that God is Judge!’

I wrote the following poem some years back and I hope it captures some of what I have been saying in these articles.

§§§§§§§§§§§§

Sovereign Lord your hand is guiding

All the destinies of man.

Nations, families, cultures, kingdoms,

Flow as water through your hand.

Yet your rule is kind and good, Strong and wise and gentle;

Leaving none who seek you crushed

But calmed and gladly humbled.

 

Sovereign Judge the world is aching

Through its shame and wrongful ways.

You are showing your displeasure

In the tumults of our age

Yet your wrath is righteousness,

Purging our pollution;

Wishing not we be condemned,

But that we be chastened.

 

Sovereign Father, all your actions

Lead us to your own dear Son,

By whose death all failure’s terrors

Are absolved, forever shunned.

By your unexpected love You have won us Father.

Let us do what pleases you,

Be your new creation.

 

Sovereign Lord and Judge and Father,

Hallowed by your holy name.

May your kingdom come in glory,

May your gracious will be done.