Jesus as Judge, Part 5 – God’s Anger

Why does God become so angry?  Is He not a loving God? 

His desire,

‘…God our Saviour, …wants all to be saved. and to come to the knowledge of the truth.’  1 Timothy 2:3

His anger and wrath is rooted in man’s refusal to understand how important eternal life with Him is.  God got very angry with the Israelites when they broke the Covenant because it was their ‘guarantee’ of eternal life, 

‘And if we are careful to obey all this law before the Lord our God, as He has commanded us, that will be our righteousness.’  Deuteronomy 6:25

The apex of God’s wrath will be in future, 

‘..Fall on us and hide us from the face 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 can stand.’  Revelation 6:16

People who refuse to be saved from eternal punishment by faith in Jesus, cause His anger.  God makes the Gospel available to the very end,

‘Then I saw another angel flying in mid-air, and he had the eternal Gospel to proclaim to those who live on the earth – to every nation, tribe, language and people.’  Revelation 14:6

God wants people to have the security of an eternal stay in the Kingdom of peace, love, harmony and fellowship.  Therefore He becomes angry when people do not understand and accept His concerns.

Jesus as Judge, Part 4 – what about the ‘good’ person?

Doesn’t the ‘good’ person deserve to also be in God’s eternal Kingdom?  Remarkably many people believe that will happen but there is a problem.  

Jesus, through His work on the Cross,

• Exchanged our sins for His righteousness.
• Made peace with the Father. 
• Unified all people who believe in Him.
• Gave His followers the Holy Spirit.   

The ‘good’ person does not automatically have one of those glorious benefits, unless he/she has been born again.  

Let’s just concentrate on the Holy Spirit.  

Many people do not realize that life in the New Jerusalem would be impossible without the Holy Spirit.  Imagine there are a few billion elect who live in the New Jerusalem – remember it is a massive city, a cube of about 1,200 miles or 2,200 kilometers.  Imagine the mess if they must all assemble for the wedding feast of the Lamb as described in Revelation 19:6-7.  The Holy Spirit will still direct each one personally to prevent ‘traffic jams.’  The Holy Spirit is with us eternally.  

It is only Jesus who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.  Therefore if there is no Jesus, there is no Holy Spirit to help, guide and teach.  That alone excludes the ‘good’ person.  Even if he or she lives a good life (according to worldly standards, not necessarily God’s).  

In this age God’s love, mercy and grace through Jesus is available to all people.  Nobody is excluded (not even the ‘good’ person) but in God’s Kingdom, we do it His way, not our own.

Jesus as Judge, Part 2, Will Jesus be fair?

In the previous blog, ‘Jesus as Judge,’ we saw that Jesus was, 

‘..tempted in every way, just as we are – yet was without sin.’  Hebrews 4:15

Therefore Jesus is perfectly suited to be the Judge at the Great White Throne Judgement. 

‘…the Father judges no one, but has entrusted all judgment to the Son…’  John 5:22

In this blog we want to discuss that Jesus is the perfect Judge because God has no favorites.

‘For God does not show favoritism.’ Romans 2:11

If God had favorites, fair judgement would be impossible.  Still, the question is, how will a darling of the world versus a nobody, be judged?  Compare the poor man who ekes out a living, with the flashy successful businessman, politician, actor, et cetera?  What about the beauty queen or career woman versus an ordinary housewife? 

Will Jesus be influenced by rank or success?  Let’s look how Jesus treated king Herod when Jesus appeared before him at His trial,

‘He [Herod] plied Him [Jesus] with many questions, but Jesus gave him no answer.’  Luke 23:9

Jesus showed us that He was not intimidated by rank.  Nor was He in the least scared to tell the Pharisees and the teachers of the law the truth, 

‘Woe to you, teachers of the Law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the Kingdom of heaven in men’s faces.  You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to.’  Matthew 23:13

(This is so reminiscent, in our day, of some ‘theologians’ who do their best to lead followers of Jesus astray.  They did it 2,000 years ago.) 

Why Jesus cannot favor anybody 

With favoritism, no fair judgment is possible.  We will all scrutinize Jesus’ every judgment.  At stake is eternal destinations, one good and one bad.   The slightest form of favoritism will taint the Judge’s character.  Since Jesus is holy, we can be sure there will be no preferential treatment for anybody.  Judgment will be based on what we did while on earth.