THE RETRIBUTION OF GOD AND COMBATTING INJUSTICE – THE DELICATE BALANCE OF JUDGMENT AND MERCY – PART 3
THE DELICATE BALANCE OF JUDGMENT AND MERCY – CAN HUMAN BEINGS HANDLE IT?
One of the mysteries we only partly understand as Christians is what I might call the balancing of the judgment of God against His mercy (and we could include love and grace). Judgment says that the sinner must die an eternal separation from the presence of a righteous God. Mercy says that the sinner must be rescued and changed so he can live in the presence of God. Actually it is only in Christ that these two aspects of the Father’s demands can be met. The writer to the Hebrews uses the expression for Christ as “Faithful and Merciful High Priest.” These two qualities again, are in apparent contradiction. I heard an illustration once that highlighted the difficulty of marrying these two qualities.
A farmer sent his two sons to market, each with a pig and gave them precise instructions to be punctual for the sale. One son belted the pig along the road in an urgent fashion and was unkind to the animal but he arrived in time for the sale. That son was faithful to the father’s demand but not merciful. The other son felt rather kindly disposed to the animal and wandered along with it without putting any stress on it. He arrived at the sale but was too late and could not fulfil his father’s instructions. He was merciful but not faithful. As human beings we err usually one way or the other but it is a blessed truth that the facets of faithfulness and mercy are perfectly united in Christ. Likewise the seemingly opposing qualities of judgment and mercy are also united in Him.
Because of sin the whole system of this world and all in it are subject to the full judgment of God. That judgment should have meant the whole annihilation of everything that is here. However God’s mercy has extended to the fallen creation, and His love, resulting in the Saviour’s sacrifice, has purchased its redemption. The redemption has only one legitimate ground of acceptance - that of sacrificial purity, and the only One who could meet those demands was the Son of God. It is through Jesus Christ, therefore, that the full expression of grace and love can be appreciated. It is only through Him that the proper perspective of judgment and mercy can be appreciated satisfactorily.
Only when we understand that we have been delivered from God’s just judgment, can we also appreciate that that just judgment continues to hang over the heads of all who are unredeemed with solemn consequences. The retribution of God is one specific aspect of God’s overall judgment and it is proposed that the delivery of that retribution is often delayed, because it is tempered with love and mercy for the sinner. A verse from James’s letter, chapter 2 and verse 13 speaks about mercy triumphing over judgment and I believe that is the way God would like it to be. He would desire all sinners to repent and be converted so the demonstration of His mercy over judgment could be seen. {{James 2:13 “Judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment.”}}
The retributive judgment is certain of course in the absence of repentance as the nature of a holy God cannot allow sin to be unrewarded. The truth of, “Whatever a man sows that he shall also reap,” has not been cancelled. Therefore the sins and wrongs committed against the children of God will reap their just rewards, but God who is rich in mercy, does not want the sinner to be lost or damned in hell. His retribution may not be forthcoming at this time, but it continues to hover. {{Ephesians 2:3-6 “Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest, but GOD, BEING RICH IN MERCY, BECAUSE OF HIS GREAT LOVE WITH WHICH HE LOVED US, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.”}}
Let not the persecutor, the liar, the hypocrite or the evil man or woman think the child of God can be treated in an unfair or vindictive manner. Demonic forces are at work now at the end of the Church age but let the hateful man and persecutor beware! God will keep His own possession as the apple of His eye and any evil against His children will result in just retribution. {{Psalm 17:6-9 “I have called upon You for You will answer me, O God. Incline Your ear to me; hear my speech. Wondrously show Your loving kindness, O Saviour of those who take refuge at Your right hand from those who rise up against them. KEEP ME AS THE APPLE OF THE EYE. Hide me in the shadow of Your wings, from the wicked who despoil me, my deadly enemies who surround me.”}}
His children take refuge at His right hand; that is a scriptural expression for the place of strength. His children take refuge under His wings, but as the hen protects her own while carefully watching the enemy, so does the Lord. God sees from the stronghold of His compassion. Let not the sinner think he can act with impunity. The Christian’s Lord will not tolerate it and the sinner will be held to account.
Perhaps a striking example of this accountability is afforded to us in the Old Testament book of Esther. Rising above all things in that book, can be seen the Lord who is the God who goes before in the interests of His servants. God placed Esther in her lofty position so that through her, the sinister plans of the Devil’s executioner could be thwarted.
Let us take a closer look at two men, Mordecai the righteous one, and Haman the evil one whose intense Satanic desire was the extermination of the Jewish race from the face of the earth. This wicked son of an Agagite loved the praise and honour of men to satisfy his vanity, but Mordecai would not bow and worship this self-deluded god. So infuriated was Haman that his vindictiveness sought the destruction of all Jews.
Haman managed to get the Persian King Xerxes’ approval to issue a decree for that destruction of the Jewish race on an approved day, and when the Jews learned of it, they resorted to prayer and fasting. Nothing seemed to happen though, to effect the removal of that decree and every day the hour of their catastrophe drew nearer.
THE VERY NIGHT before Haman intended to request special permission from the king to have Mordecai hanged on the 75 foot gallows that he had constructed in his very own home, God intervened on behalf of His people. The king could not sleep and through the reading of the palace chronicles, he was motivated to act on Mordecai’s behalf by rewarding him for the time Mordecai had saved the king’s life but had remained unrewarded. When morning arrived, Haman had entered the court to seek the king’s permission for his offensive deed but the king first asked Haman a question. In a dramatic touch of irony, instead of leaving the court to execute Mordecai, he was compelled to leave in order to honour Mordecai, and that publicly. This we must note, that all through this, Mordecai had remained humble before his God, knowing it was God who would justify.
Chapter seven of Esther is one of the most literary dramatic chapters in the entire bible. Haman had spread a net with evil intent for Mordecai but had become ensnared in his own net. They hanged Haman on the very gallows he had built for Mordecai. God’s retribution was planned in His own way and it was swift in coming. Further judgments followed which we won’t take up here.
Consider how these verses from Psalms demonstrate wonderfully how God can deliver His own from the clutches of the evil opposers. {{Psalm 35:4-5 “Let those be ashamed and dishonoured who seek my life. Let those be turned back and humiliated who devise evil against me for You are my rock and my fortress.” Psalm 31:3-4 “You are my Rock and Fortress. For Your name’s sake You will lead and guide me. YOU WILL PULL ME OUT OF THE NET WHICH THEY HAVE SECRETLY LAID FOR ME, for You are my strength.” Psalm 9:16 “The Lord has made Himself known. He has executed judgment. In the work of his own hands, THE WICKED IS SNARED.” Psalm 7:14-16 “Behold, he travails with wickedness, and he conceives mischief, and brings forth falsehood. He has dug a pit and hollowed it out AND HAS FALLEN INTO THE HOLE WHICH HE MADE. His mischief will return upon his own head, and his violence will descend upon his own pate.”}}
I don’t know if Mordecai knew these Psalms, and if he did, whether they formed the basis for his prayer, but I would like to feel there was a strong possibility he did. Neither Esther nor Mordecai forcefully planned any act of revenge. Wrong had been done and secret plans of the enemy had been devised but the godly committed it all to the Lord Who heard all about it AND – {{Deuteronomy 32:35 “VENGEANCE IS MINE, AND RETRIBUTION. In due time their foot will slip, for the day of their calamity is near, and the impending things are hastening upon them.” AND Hebrews 10:30 We know Him who said, “VENGEANCE IS MINE. I WILL REPAY,” and again, “The Lord will judge His people.”}} How wonderful it is He keeps us and loves us as His children. What comes against one of His saints, comes against Him. He will keep the redeemed as the apple of His eye.
One additional aspect of the judgment against Edom would be fitting to consider here. The great psalm, Psalm 137, one of the exilic psalms written in Babylon, has not forgotten the part Edom played in the destruction of Jerusalem. Nor will the part Babylon played be overlooked. {{Psalm 137:7 Remember, O LORD, against the SONS OF EDOM the day of Jerusalem, who said, “Raze it, raze it to its very foundation.” Psalm 137:8 “O DAUGHTER OF BABYLON, you devastated one, how blessed will be the one who repays you with the recompense with which you have repaid us.”}} The writer in verse 7 is requesting the Lord to remember what Edom has done, the horrible antagonism it displayed against the Jews, that bitter animosity which it always retained. We looked at that seriously in PART 2 of this Series.
Then in a similar vein the following statements are made in verses 8 and 9, {{“O daughter of Babylon, you devastated one, how blessed will be the one who repays you with the recompense with which you have repaid us. How blessed will be the one who seizes and dashes your little ones against the rock.”}} If we don’t understand something of the dispensational aspect of the prayers and desires of God’s saints, we might have difficulty in comprehending the requests of the psalmist. The people of that age were under the Law of Moses where an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth was the demand of law and considered to be the proper dispensation of justice in most cases. Their enemies became the enemies of God and God’s enemies became their enemies. And yet permeating all that there was mercy and compassion for those within the commonwealth of Israel, in a balance with the righteous demands of the Law. It was correct for them to express themselves in that seemingly harsh way, and correct for them to pray in that fashion.
In the dispensation of grace in which Christians live, such a prayer and desire as the ones in verses 8 and 9 would be hard to follow and would raise more than a few eyebrows in a prayer meeting if it happened to be prayed. It would be totally inappropriate in this age of grace. The attitude of Christians in the matter of revenge and retribution will be examined shortly in detail.
In the Old Testament it would seem fully correct to pray for the retribution of God to come upon God’s enemies. The psalms contain many examples of this and the reader will find prayer requests often. Some Christians have expressed concern at a number of verses towards the end of Psalm 139. Psalm 139:19-20 say this: {{“O that You would slay the wicked, O God. Depart from me, therefore, men of bloodshed, for they speak against You wickedly, and Your enemies take Your name in vain.”}} Objections are raised as it is considered not “Christian” to treat enemies this way. Here David prays for the destruction of his (and therefore, God’s) enemies and expresses his hatred of those who rise up against God. There was a stark contrast between righteousness and unrighteousness. One position must stand and the other must be destroyed. The concept of destroying one’s hurtful enemies is found in the Old Testament. The saints looked to God for His permission to execute retribution, or they looked to God to achieve that retribution for them.
Psalm 139 mentions about taking the name of the Lord in vain. This is well covered by the Law and it was a most serious offence. Today it is everywhere and in my opinion the United States is the most blasphemous nation on earth. The name of the Lord is always taken in vain. It makes me cringe. Maybe that is one reason why God has lifted His hand from the USA and let them go their own way.
While we are examining prayers of that nature (apparent vengeance), it is interesting to look at a New Testament passage found in Revelation chapter six. Have you ever wondered at the strangeness of the group of saints in verse ten of that chapter? Let us look at three of the verses, {{Revelation 6:9-11. “And when He broke the fifth seal, I saw underneath the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God, and because of the testimony which they had maintained, and they cried out with a loud voice, saying, “HOW LONG, O LORD, HOLY AND TRUE, WILL YOU REFRAIN FROM JUDGING AND AVENGING OUR BLOOD ON THOSE WHO DWELL ON THE EARTH?” And there was given to each of them a white robe; and they were told that they should REST FOR A LITTLE WHILE LONGER, UNTIL the number of their fellow servants and their brethren who were to be killed even as they had been, should be completed also.”}}
The request of these Tribulation saints was for their Lord to avenge their blood on those living at that time on the earth but they could not understand what was holding back the hand of God. We shall see how that Christians do not go around in this church age calling down fire from heaven or asking that the earth open up and swallow the enemy. These saints were crying that their blood might be avenged. They were earnest and urgent in this because they cried with a loud voice. Were they correct in this request to the Lord?
Notice how the following verse answers their request. {{Revelation 6:11 “There was given to each of them a white robe and they were told that they should rest for a little while longer until the number of their fellow servants, and their brethren who were to be killed even as they had been, should be completed also.”}} It is all important to see that they were not reproved, or in any way reprimanded for the specific petition they made. In fact their Lord fully accepts and answers their appeal. They had some waiting to do - only a little longer until the number of saintly Tribulation martyrs was complete and the vicious deeds of unjustness upon these saints was ripe for revenge. Then their prayer would be answered. God would pour forth His retribution.
This is not a perplexing passage when we realise that the apparent vengeful nature of their prayer will be correct for the age in which they will be living. Revelation 4:1 would indicate the rapture of the church as the Lord calls His blood-bought saints of the Church age up to heaven with - “COME UP HERE.” Then the verse goes on to say that God would then show us through John the things that will then happen when the church age has run its course (called, “after these things). After the removal of the church from this earth God’s great day of wrath will come to this planet in the form of one terrible judgment sweeping in on the heels of another. It is the time called “The Great Tribulation,” and the faithful preachers of the Gospel of the Kingdom in that age will be martyred. They live in a time of great universal judgment and their prayer is correct for their age, just as David’s prayers and actions were correct for His.
It would be hard to distinguish judgment from retribution in that age because the two then will be closely related in the outpouring of God’s wrath, for the great day of God’s wrath has dawned as {{Revelation 6:16-17 informs us. “and they said to the mountains and to the rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb for the great day of their wrath has come, and who is able to stand?”}} Their demand for God’s retribution and their expectation of it, will be correct.
ronaldf@aapt.net.au
