FIRST QUARTER 2024
SABBATH SCHOOL INSIGHT #6
FEBRUARY 10, 2024
"I WILL ARISE"

 

 

God is Faithful and Just 

“If we confess our sins, [God] is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9, NKJV).

The story of the Bible reveals how God has been faithful and just in all He has done.

Lucifer claimed “that God was not just in imposing laws upon the angels; that in requiring submission and obedience from His creatures, He was seeking merely the exaltation of Himself. It was therefore necessary to demonstrate before the inhabitants of heaven, and of all the worlds, that God's government is just, His law perfect.” —Ellen G. White, Patriarchs and Prophets, p 42.

“It was [Lucifer’s] policy to perplex with subtle arguments concerning the purposes of God. Everything that was simple he shrouded in mystery, and by artful perversion cast doubt upon the plainest statements of Jehovah.” —ibid., p. 41.

After sin entered the world, injustice became normal. Cain killed Abel and refused to repent. Selfishness, wickedness, and violence spread, until God said, “The end of all flesh has come before me” (Genesis 6:13). If He didn’t do something to save the human race, they would destroy themselves. So with love for humanity, God asked Noah to build an ark. Love and justice were linked together.

Our human perspective is narrow and limited. God’s perspective is eternal. After sin entered the world, it appeared that God was unjust by allowing people to live, “because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed” (Romans 3:25).

Four thousand years after sin entered the human race, God demonstrated “His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier” by “the faithfulness of Jesus” (Romans 3:26, New English Translation. See also the New English Translation notes).

In individual cases, it looks like God is not being just and righteous. John the Baptist was killed after serving God faithfully. Peter was rescued from prison after speaking boldly for God. Stephen spoke boldly for God and was stoned to death. Isaiah was sawn in two, but Daniel was saved from the lion’s den.

Why does He save some and not others? Why does He choose to heal some people and not others? Why are some people protected in a car wreck and others are killed when they all prayed for God’s protection?

God has not given answers about each individual situation or circumstance.

Is God being unjust in these situations? Again, our perspective is limited and narrow. In the big picture that God understands, He is working to bring good out of every situation for those who trust Him (see Romans 8:28).

When Stephen was being stoned, he asked God to forgive the people who were stoning him. This impressed Saul. When Jesus appeared to Saul, He said, “It’s hard to kick against the goads” (Acts 26:14). In other words, Saul was fighting against the conviction of the Holy Spirit. After he was converted, Saul became a champion for God. When Stephen is resurrected, he will praise God that his death could be used to win the heart of Saul. Stephen will not question God’s “justice” in his life.

Joseph could have gotten angry with God for allowing his brothers to throw him into a pit, threaten to kill him, and sell him as a slave. Instead, he chose to trust God and serve Him in every situation in which he was placed. As a result, Joseph became a ruler in Egypt so he could save the very ones who hated him and sold him into slavery.

Joseph was able to see the bigger picture when he told his brothers, “I am Joseph your brother, whom you sold into Egypt. But now, do not therefore be grieved or angry with yourselves because you sold me here; for God sent me before you to preserve life” (Genesis 45:4,5). Joseph did not question God’s “justice” in his life. He was thankful to be used to save his family.

When we choose to trust God as Joseph did, God will work all things together for good in His time and way. For “God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it. (1 Corinthians 10:13).

We are called to wait upon the Lord to provide His plan of escape. Many people refer to this verse and say, “God will not allow me to be tempted beyond what I am able to bear.” They often leave off the last part of the verse. Then when the trial seems beyond what they can bear, they give up and create their own escape plan.

In 2 Corinthians 1:8 Paul wrote something that seems to contradict what he wrote in 1 Corinthians 10:13. “We do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, of our trouble which came to us in Asia: that we were burdened beyond measure, above strength, so that we despaired even of life.”

Paul could have gotten bitter and blamed God for not being faithful with His promise, for this was a trial that was beyond what he could bear. Instead, He focused on what he thought was God’s plan of escape, the resurrection.

“Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead, who delivered us from so great a death, and does deliver us; in whom we trust that He will still deliver us” (2 Corinthians 1:9, 10).

If the resurrection was God’s plan of escape, Paul accepted that. To his surprise, God delivered them in a wonderful way.

Learning to wait upon God and trust Him is always the key to living with peace and bringing glory to God. This is also the key to being just and righteous in all our relationships with others, no matter how they treat us.

In the civil rights movement during the 1960’s, Martin Luther King, Jr. and others chose to trust God while they brought to light the mistreatment and injustice that happened all around them. Instead of getting bitter and reacting with violence, they chose to be respectful in their non- violent resistance.

Unfortunately, King was murdered in 1968 at the young age of 39. His martyrdom and the non- violent resistance did lead the United States government to change the unjust laws that led people to treat black people as less valuable than white people. Love won out over hate.

Injustice on earth will continue to happen as long as Satan is alive and sinners give him control of their lives.

God will still act righteously and justly in His time and way. Ultimately, that will take place in the final phase of the heavenly judgment when those who loved sin and hated the light will stand before God. They will see all the times they rejected God and mistreated others.

Isaiah describes their experience. “The sinners in Zion are afraid; Fearfulness has seized the hypocrites: ‘Who among us shall dwell with the devouring fire? Who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings?’” (Isaiah 33:14).

Their mental torture will be great as their life choices flash before them in the presence of God and everyone else.

Isaiah gives the surprising answer to their question, “Who shall dwell with the everlasting burnings?”

“He who walks righteously and speaks uprightly, He who despises the gain of oppressions, who gestures with his hands, refusing bribes, who stops his ears from hearing of bloodshed, and shuts his eyes from seeing evil” (Isaiah 33:15).

The meek and the righteous who were mistreated on earth will be transformed so they can stand in God’s presence, rejoicing in His loving justice.

The contrast is great. 1 John 4:17-19 describes the difference between the two groups.

"Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as He is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love. We love Him because He first loved us.”

Those who have been transformed by God’s love rejoice in His presence.

Those who loved sin and hated the light will be filled with fear and torment as they remember all the times they rejected the light God sent them. They will eventually acknowledge that God is righteous and just in all His ways (see Philippians 2:9, 10; Romans 14:10, 11).

Then they will die from the mental torture of it all.

In Luke 12:4,5, Jesus describes the order of those final events. I am going to quote it from the Young’s Literal Translation (emphasis supplied).

“And I say to you, my friends, be not afraid of those killing the body, and after these things are not having anything over to do; 5 but I will show to you, whom ye may fear; Fear him who, after the killing, is having authority to cast to the gehenna; yes, I say to you, Fear ye Him.”

Notice that the unrighteous will die before they are thrown into Gehenna. Most translations use the word hell. Gehenna was the garbage pit outside Jerusalem that kept burning from all the waste that was continually thrown into it. Gehenna became a symbol or nickname for the fire that will cleanse the earth from all the effects of sin at the end of time (See 2 Peter 3:13).

Satan portrays God as totally unjust and unrighteous when he leads people to believe that God will torture the wicked forever in an everlasting hell fire. That would mean that God would have to work a miracle to keep them alive in order to continue their punishment.

Fortunately, the truth is they will die before they are cast into the fire that will cleanse the earth from all the effects of sin. Then God will create “new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (2 Peter 3:12, 13).

Then the promise will be fulfilled that God will make His home with us on this brand-new earth.

“And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, ‘Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away.’ Then He who sat on the throne said, ‘Behold, I make all things new.’ And He said to me, ‘Write, for these words are true and faithful.” (Revelation 21:3-5).

True and faithful – that is what God is. May we be so rooted and grounded in His love and truth and faithfulness so that we will not be shaken when God allows events that we don’t understand. May we be like Joseph and Stephen, choosing to trust God and serve Him in every situation. Then when we have opportunity, may we be able to forgive and serve even those who hurt us, leaving them in God’s hands. In doing so, maybe they will become like Paul and be converted and live for God.

 

~Pastor Clinton Meharry