September 11, 2001 is a date nobody will forget for generations to
come. Just like many other people have experienced tribal conflicts and grave
natural disasters in Haiti and other Asian countries. Many terrible things have
happened in this world, including tsunamis and hurricanes of biblical
proportions. And certainly every one of us has our own individual tragedy that we
had to deal with or have dealt with. There
is a lot of damage and many of us live in pain.
Loads of people are still recovering
from the blows they’ve received and are trying to make sense of why all of this
happens. Sadly, many Christian leaders haven’t helped matters. In bold
declarations, they’ve said these things are the judgment of God upon our sins. That
is why people even in corporate world have called natural disasters “Acts of
God”. It’s so sad that God has been misrepresented and people in pain have a
distorted view of God. They see God as responsible for the pains that they are
going through. In truth nothing could be further from the truth. James 3:11
says “Does a fountain send forth at the same place
sweet water and bitter?”
How can people cry to God for help and the fortitude to bear their
loss for recovery when they are told that the same was simply carrying his judgment
on them. You cannot receive help from someone who you believe wants you dead. That
has been the gameplan of the Devil from day one. He was able to convince Eve
that God was withholding some benefits from them by telling them not to eat the
tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Uptil now many people are being led to
believe is in heaven with whips waiting for them to make a mistake. We see
God as an angry God.
This false validation for why bad things happen grieves God. It’s totally missing the point of why Jesus came. Jesus
forever changed the way God relates to mankind. Now it’s on record that there
are scriptural examples of God’s tragic judgment on sin. Adam’s sin opened the
portal for death to reign on the earth even over those who had not sinned in
the same way as he. The entrance of death has found many manifestations in the
form of murder, sickness, famine, earthquakes and other natural disasters. But
God’s greatest act of judgment was when He placed all of His wrath for our sins
upon Jesus. This forever satisfied God’s wrath. Since that time, God hasn’t
been judging our sins (2 Cor. 5:19). God’s
not angry at us. He’s not even in a bad mood because He is satisfied with the
payment of sin by His son.
When Jesus was born there was a
great celebration in heaven that extended to the earth. The angels’ joy at the
birth of Jesus in Bethlehem was not hidden.
Luke 2:13-14 says,
“And suddenly there was
with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory
to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.”
This scripture is very familiar
to us, yet there is a lot of misunderstanding about what it’s meaning. Basically,
this passage has been interpreted to say that peace will come on earth because
Jesus was born. That’s not why these angels were praising God. If that
interpretation were true, compare what Jesus said in Matthew 10:34-36 as it would
to contradict this.
He said,
“Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I
came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance
against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in
law against her mother in law. And a man’s foes shall be they of his own
household.”
Jesus Himself said He was not
sent to bring peace on the earth among people. The peace that the angels of Luke
2:13-14 were praising God for was peace BETWEEN
God and Man. They were broadcasting the end of God’s war on sin. Peace
now reigns between God and man. Reconciliation was finally achieved!
Prior to Jesus’ coming, there was
wrath from God against mankind for his sins. It wasn’t total wrath. Even in the
Old Testament, we see God’s mercy and grace. Yet the Old Testament Law was a
ministry of wrath (Rom. 4:15 with 2 Cor. 3:7 and 9), and people’s sins were
held against them. Not because God wanted it but because insisted that he would
relate to God in his own strength. Hence the law was given for man to meet God’s
holy standard. But when Jesus came, God quit holding people’s sins against
them.
This is exactly what 2 Corinthians 5:19 and 21 says:
“To wit, that God was in
Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto
them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation…For he hath made
him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness
of God in him.”
The word “reconciliation” is talking about making peace. God was
no longer holding us accountable. Instead, He imputed our sins to Jesus, making
Jesus accountable for our sins. Jesus
became what we were so we could become what He was—the righteousness of God. On
the cross there was a divine exchange. Our sin for his righteousness and our
judgment for his justification.
Jesus was like a lightning rod
that drew all the judgment of God unto Himself. He not only bore our sins; He
actually became sin (2 Cor. 5:21).
Jesus said this in John 12:27-32:
“Now is my soul troubled;
and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: but for this cause came I
unto this hour. Father, glorify thy name. Then came there a voice from heaven, saying,
I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again. The people therefore, that
stood by, and heard it, said that it thundered: others said, An angel spake to
him. Jesus answered and said, This voice came not because of me, but for your
sakes. Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be
cast out. And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.”
This scripture like many others
have been misinterpreted to mean that if God is properly glorified in our
preaching, then He will draw all people unto Himself. But that is not what this
passage is saying.
If you look in the King James Version Bible, notice that the word “men” in
verse 32 is italicized. That means it wasn’t in the original language. The
translators put this word in italics to let you know this was their addition,
but it wasn’t a part of the text. If you take this verse in context, I believe
that the Lord was saying He would draw all JUDGMENT to Himself. Jesus, like a
lightning rod, attracted all of God’s thunderous judgment for all of mankind’s
sins for all time unto Himself.
All the murder, all the
perversion, every vile and rotten sin imaginable, all sickness, and all disease
ever known to mankind actually entered into His physical human body and spirit.
Isaiah 52:14 talks about the crucifixion of Jesus and says that He was disfigured
more than any man to the point that He was unrecognizable as a human being.
That could not just happen from
physical beatings, especially since the Word says that not a single bone was
broken in His body (Ps. 34:20 with John 19:36). I believe His body was
completely disfigured from the cancers, tumors, diseases, deformities, and
anything else human beings have ever suffered. Mel Gibson’s movie widely criticized
“Passion of the Christ” could not depict the entire of the sufferings he went
through on our behalf.
Jesus didn’t pray for the cup to
be taken from Him just because of the physical pain He would suffer but because
He did not want to become sin. He hated becoming what He came to redeem us
from. And the worst part of all Jesus’ sufferings was total rejection from His
Father, something he had not experienced before.
Matthew 27:46 says,
“And about the ninth hour
Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to
say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”
God the Father forsook Jesus so
you and I would never be forsaken. Everything that you and I would have
suffered, through endless years in eternity—the grief, the pain and, worst of
all, the complete separation from the presence of God—Jesus experienced. It was
the first time that he called the father “God” so that you and I can call him
Father. And He experienced all of this for us. When we say God is judging our sins
as individuals or even as a nation, we are declaring invalid what Jesus did. That would be “double jeopardy.”
When John the Baptist saw Jesus,
he cried “Behold the lamb that takes away the sin of the world. Sin isn’t a problem with God
anymore. It’s us the church that has made it a major deal. Neither past, present, nor future sins
can separate you from God. The only people who will go to hell are those who
have spurned and rejected the greatest sacrifice that has ever been made. In heaven, you won’t answer for
your sin; Jesus already has. You will answer for your acceptance or rejection
of Jesus. Hebrews 2:3a says ‘how shall we
escape if we ignore so great a salvation?...”
Natural disasters are just that—natural disasters. We live in a corrupted
world where bad things happen, but God isn’t the cause of them. If He were, we
would not see the cases of miraculous survivors like some who escaped death on September
11. Surely all of us deserve the judgment of God. But, praise God, we don’t get
what we deserve. That is why it is called grace.
Many people say, “If God doesn’t
judge America, He will have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah.” The truth
after the cross is that “If God judges
America, He will have to apologize to Jesus.” Thank God for Jesus! He is the propitiation
for our sins and has reconciled us back to God. He is now our father!
