Submitted by: skeezix | View Member Profile | View Other Posts
Created: 6/26/2010
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I have, like the blind men and the elephant, my own description of the Love and Justice of God. This is my poor attempt to expound on an infinite theme, one we will explore forever and never fully understand.
Ellen White and Scripture both echo the theme of unity. Jesus prayed that we might be one as He and the Father are one. Ellen White says “Press together. Press together.” By carefully studying such passages, we discover a great principle: Sin is Divisive. Righteousness is Unifying.
A careful study of both Scripture and Ellen White yields another great principle: Sin and Righteousness are personal choices. Though Noah, Daniel and Job were in the land, they could save none but themselves. It is a personal choice of each individual.
As a child, I wondered why God would bother to create Lucifer. It seems like He would have avoided a lot of trouble if He would have torn up Lucifer’s blueprint. This question really bothered me. Was God stupid? Wasn’t God omniscient, as I was taught? Did God have a death-wish? Then, as an adult, I found an answer which satisfies me: God’s government has no element of force within it. If God had refused to make Lucifer, He would have be forcing Lucifer to not sin by not creating him. The whole idea of choice would have been a sham. We would have been robots.
God chose to give His creation the power of choice. Love from robots is not terribly satisfying. Love from someone who chooses to love you is indeed satisfying. God wanted beings to love Him, not just to echo a robotic mantra of “I love God.”
Lucifer was the highest being God created. He was the Covering Cherub. He shielded God’s glory from the rest of the heavenly beings. He knew God better than any other being in the Universe. In some sense, God loved Lucifer more than He loved the other angels. God trusted Lucifer with a greater knowledge of Himself than other beings had.
Lucifer, exercising his freedom of choice, chose to rebel against God. He chose to cease loving God. He chose to love himself instead.
Jesus, exercising his freedom of choice, chose not to love Himself, but emptied Himself and became a created being. He chose to continue loving both God and Mankind.
Paul tells us that we will judge angels. In heaven, God’s righteousness will unify the entire creation. He will not arbitrarily sentence the sinners to burn for so much time. Instead, we will all join in making the decision about the sentence each sinner gets. We will study our parent’s, our sibling’s, our child’s, our spouse’s history and we will participate in sentencing them. In each case, the sentence will be a unanimous decision. We will also participate in sentencing the wicked angels, including Satan.
After the New Jerusalem settles on the split Mount of Olives, the wicked are raised to life. They arm and attack the city. Their progress is arrested not by a cannonade from the city, but by a huge video presentation.
This video will show the entire Great Controversy, from beginning to end. All, both inside the city and outside will be unable to take their eyes off it. They will see their part in the Controversy. They will see where and how they chose the side they are on.
The result of this instant replay will be two fold. The doomed will agree that God is Just and Loving and that their sentence is correct. Thus, even the wicked will unite with the rest of the universe in validating their sentence. Satan will also.
The doomed will receive the full measure of the Divisiveness of Sin. All the relationships between the wicked will be destroyed. The doomed will attack each other and they will attack Satan. Finally, Satan will have lost all of his power. He will have no power over any being. None of the wicked will have any power. Each of the doomed will be the king in a Kingdom of One. Only then, when Sin has totally fractured its followers, is it safe for God to do His strange act. No one, saint or sinner, will regret their passing.
And then, while the fire burns and cleanses the universe, I hear God weeping, saying, nay, shrieking in horrible anguish, “Oh, Lucifer, Lucifer, son of the morning. How can I let you go? You were perfect in all of your ways, until iniquity was found in you. How can I let you go? I put diamonds, sapphires, pearls on you. But that beauty corrupted your soul. How can I let you go? But that is the choice you made and I will not compel you to choose otherwise. Oh, Lucifer, Lucifer, son of the morning, How can I let you go?”
And every time God wipes His eyes, Lucifer burns just a little longer, because God is having such a hard time letting go of the crowning angel of His creation.
Thus the question about how can God be Loving and Just at the same time will be forever answered. It was accomplished at an infinite personal cost to Himself and with an equally infinite amount of anguish. He will look at us, His redeemed subjects, and He will be satisfied. In His eyes, it was worth the infinite cost, the infinite anguish.
Interestingly, after this terrible experiment in Sin, God is never described as having covering cherubs. Instead, we will live with Him and He with us. He will be our God and we will be His people. We are described as following the Lamb wherever He goes. It appears that somehow God is now free to fully reveal Himself to the entire Universe in a way He could not before Sin entered.
