Many struggle to understand the judgment of God. Some look at Noah’s flood and feel sorry for those who drowned. Or they read about Sodom and Gomorrah and feel sympathetic toward the people of these two cities who were slain. Others look at the battles David fought and wonder how God could ask Israel to wipe out entire nations. Finally, those who read Revelation may find themselves feeling sorry for those who will die in the various judgments of God, including the final Battle of Armageddon.
There are two things we must consider when we are tempted to judge God for exercising His Divine Judgment:
First, we should focus on the holiness of God.
If you find yourself feeling compassion toward those who endure God’s judgment, you are focusing on the suffering of the Creation rather than the suffering of the Creator. That is, God is holy and these people have deeply and repeatedly blasphemed His holiness. Scoffers will angrily argue that if God is so big and so powerful, how can anything people do really matter to Him? The answer is that God loves every person He has made. He cares and He has made Himself vulnerable to their behavior. Not only that, but God cares about the way these people have hurt and persecuted God’s children. Look at the evil around you that God sees every day. God is incredibly patient. But one day His patience will run out.
That brings us to the second thing we must take into consideration before judging God for exercising His judgment:
God is incredibly patient and will not judge until people “fill up the full measure of their sins” Matthew 23:32.
That is, God watches the sin of a city, nation, or culture, and does not send judgment until the sin has ripened into its worst state. The people God judges are BEYOND THE POINT OF REPENTANCE, BEYOND THE HOPE OF FORGIVENESS.
In Genesis 15:16, God explained that although He promised the Promised Land to Abraham’s descendants, the pagan nations currently living there had not yet “filled up the full measure of their sins.” Consequently, Israel would live in Egypt for 400 years. Only then, after the Amorites and others had reached their fully sinful state, would God judge those evil nations, wiping them off the map and giving the land to Israel.
Let’s sum it up:
When the men of Noah’s day went beyond the point of repentance, God judged the whole earth with a flood, Genesis 6:5-8.
When Sodom and Gomorrah went beyond the point of repentance, the cities were judged with fire, Genesis 18:20.
When Egypt went beyond the point of repentance, the nation was judged, Genesis 15:14.
And when the nations living in the Promised Land went beyond the point of repentance, those nations were judged, Genesis 15:16.
The same will be true in the End Times. In our day and age, God displays tremendous mercy. Consider a short list of global sins: sex trafficking, pedophilia, child pornography, slavery, torture, genocide, robbery, rape, and murder, school shootings and other mass shootings. This list could go on and on, could it not? Everyone knows about the horrible things people do to each other every day. Right now, God is exercising patience. One day, His patience will run out. The world will “fill up the full measure of its sins” and God will judge.
Rather than scoff at God for His judgment, we should fall down in gratitude and worship, thanking Him for His incredible mercy and patience.
“The Lord is not slow about His promise, but is patient, not willing that ANY should perish, but that ALL should come to the knowledge of repentance” 2 Peter 3:9.
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