Wednesday, December 26, 2012

you can't have one without the other


The Word for today:
Isaiah 28


mark this: Isaiah 28:21
Judgment is God’s "strange (unfamiliar, foreign) work:"
For the LORD shall rise up as in mount Perazim, he shall be wroth as in the valley of Gibeon, that he may do his work, his strange work; and bring to pass his act, his strange act.  (Isaiah 28:21/KJV)
Lamentations 3:33 tells us that God does not afflict willingly. The Amplified Bible translates the verse more literally: God does not afflict from his heart.
In 2 Peter 3:9, we read that He is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance. (2 Peter 3:9)
But judge He does, for judge He must--because judgment is a necessary component of salvation. Judgment is as necessary a part of salvation as forgiveness is.
Consider: if God had not judged Egypt and Pharaoh--drowning them in the Red Sea--then Israel could not have been saved. Their sins were forgiven at Passover. Their deliverance wasn't complete until the judgment of Egypt at the Red Sea.
Satan's #1 strategy is to convince the world that God loves too much to judge. This strategy worked against Eve in the Garden of Eden, so Satan has used it ever since:
Eve: "God said, 'You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, lest you die.'"
Serpent: "You will not surely die." (Genesis 3:3-4)
Satan has made great strides in convincing the world that God will capitulate to His loving, grace-filled heart. The child of God is to remember that Satan is the father of lies (John 8:44).
God will not capitulate, nor compromise his character, no matter the cost. So to the cross He went, because sin exacts a price that cannot go unpaid.
The reason Jesus is both Judge and Savior is because you can't have one without the other.
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