mercy

"Believers often charge the lost with not taking hell seriously enough, but I'm not sure we take it very seriously ourselves. To hope someone burns in hell is profoundly offensive to God and proves we lack His heart."
-Beth Moore, Beloved Disciple



How many people have posed the question, "If God exists, why is there such horror and suffering in the world?" Abandoning the idea of a loving God based on the evidence that any God worth his salt would intervene to stop the bloodshed, the abuse of the innocent, the cruelty and murder and corruption, they refuse to believe such a God could stand idly by. If he did, what kind of god would he be? But what if this being does, in fact, exist. What if part of him is burning in rage at the sickness of hatred, greed and cruelty between people? What if there is a settling of accounts that is coming? What if he is deeply moved by the desire to bring justice to his world? What on earth could be holding him back?

If studying Revelation, the last book in the Bible, has convinced me of anything, it is that Justice Is Coming. An account will be made of the events on earth, and the wrath of God will be unleashed on all the misdeeds of mankind. Why is he waiting? What is he waiting for? This god, who doesn't push himself on us, but petitions for our attention, knows that each of our actions earn a wage. That the wages of selfishness are an account in the red. We will be required to pay, justice will be had. And all he wants is for us to get on his payment plan. Jesus. The last thing he wants is for us to face the court of heaven owing. So he waits and watches over the earth, hoping we take him at his word. He lets us choose. He keeps holding back the tide, hoping that we'll get it-that we cannot fix us, but there is nothing he loves more than our flawed, broken selves. He wants to save us from our selves, and there is not one of us, no matter how ugly, how twisted, how bent, that he despises. We are his creation, and he is forever bending heaven and earth to get us out of what we've gotten ourselves in to.


"As surely as I live, says the Sovereign LORD, I take no pleasure in the death of wicked people. I only want them to turn from their wicked ways so they can live."
-Ezekiel 33:11, Bible NLT