When Grace Transitions to Justice

10.25.09
J.A. Matteson

“…and you shall know My rejection.” Numbers 14:35

The Lord, incomprehensible in grace towards those who love Him, is likewise severe in His retribution against those who hate Him. The wicked Israelites who returned from the promised land with a bad report, demonstrating open distain for the previously revealed word of the Lord, brashly revealed hearts of contempt, leading many in the congregation astray in unbelief. The tragic result was their coming to personally know a fearful aspect of the Lord’s holiness; viz., His wrath. While the Lord is longsuffering a time does come when grace transitions to justice. As the writer to the Hebrews soberly noted, it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God, for our God is a consuming fire (Heb. 10:31, 12:9). To this sober reality four observations may be made.

First is the certainty of God’s rejection of the wicked. The Lord knows those who are His (2 Tim. 2:19) while those who perish in a hardened state of unbelief—the reprobate—are likewise foreknown to the Lord, these being vessels of dishonor (Rom. 9:22), raised up in their proper season so that His magnificent grace to the vessels of honor might be revealed. The certainty of the Lord’s retribution will visit the wicked, and while it may appear delayed and that they are prevailing against the Lord, its inevitable consummation is assured and will be unleashed with unimaginable fury, “Those who contend with the LORD will be shattered; against them He will thunder in the heavens, the LORD will judge the ends of the earth….” (1 Sam. 2:10). Let not the wicked naively presume for a moment that their wickedness has escaped the notice of Him to whom they will one day give a full account.

Second is the justice of God’s rejection of the wicked. The Lord’s holiness demands a corresponding recompense against wickedness which is antithetical to holiness. The divine essence of the living God is pure, undefiled, glorious, and in all ways incomprehensible to man; wickedness is an affront to the divine order and viewed by the Lord as far more than merely a repugnant annoyance. Wickedness, from the Lord’s perspective, is tantamount to cosmic treason, a frontal challenge to His person and authority, and the omnipotent Lord of Hosts is just in forcefully responding to all who transgress His Law, those following in the way of Lucifer, who with a third of the angelic host, arrogantly rebelled against the Lord, with the just result being their exile upon the earth, having been cast out of His presence in heaven. Contrite king David confessed the Lord’s righteous judgments leveled against sin, “Against You, You only, have I sinned and done what is evil in Your sight, so that You are proved right when You speak and justified when You judge” (Ps. 51:4).

Third is the severity of God’s rejection of the wicked. The same king in fear of God’s rejection pleaded that His Holy Spirit not be taken from him after his sins of adultery and murder, “Do not cast me away from Your presence, and do not take Your Holy Spirit from me” (Ps. 51:11). The Apostle Paul speaks of the terror of the Lord’s wrath as an urgent plea to unbelievers, “Knowing, therefore, the terror of the Lord, we persuade men….” (2 Cor. 5:11). But David as a beloved son of faith in the likeness of Abraham, an elect vessel of honor before the Lord, came to know His chastening and not His condemnation. The chastening leveled against the king by the King was intended for his sanctification as an object of grace, while the fury of the wrath of the Lord of Host’s towards objects of dishonor is indescribably horrifying, terrible beyond comprehension, and intended for their destruction. For just as eye has not seen nor has it entered into the heart of man all that the Lord has in store for those who love Him, in a similar fashion humanity cannot fathom the actual horrors of hell. Day by day the wicked are storing up for themselves divine wrath, with each act of wickedness the restrained vengeance of the Lord’s hot fury is further kindled, awaiting the moment in which it will be unleashed as a torrent, and the wicked will be consumed with terrors, vainly seeking to hide from the presence of the Almighty, “Therefore wait for Me," declares the Lord, "for the day I will stand up to testify. I have decided to assemble the nations, to gather the kingdoms and to pour out My wrath on them-- all my fierce anger. The whole world will be consumed by the fire of My jealous anger” (Zeph. 3:8).

Fourth is the permanence of God’s rejection of the wicked. It is appointed for man to die once and then comes judgment (Heb. 9:27). The decree of hell upon the wicked is eternal, and once the divine sentence has been enacted there is no appeal, “And the smoke of their torment rises for ever and ever. There is no rest day or night for those who worship the beast and his image, or for anyone who receives the mark of his name” (Rev. 4:11). Let every man, therefore, seek the Lord while He may be found, today is the day of salvation, and harden not your heart to His loving kindness and grace. Call upon the name of the Lord this hour and be saved from the wrath to come.