From Judgement to Mercy

From the very beginning, God has wanted to save humanity from our fallen nature. But Lucifer and his rebel angels have consistently inflamed our pride, lusts, and arrogance to lead us away from the Divine plan for glory. 

Lucifer thought that his rebellion could diminish God's glory, but he didn't understand that God can raise up sons and daughters from the beasts of the fields. He can create human beings even better than angels to not only serve Him, but to love Him, too. Just as Jesus said to the Jews who claimed to be descendants of Abraham, He could raise up more from the stones on the ground. So we are meant to replace the angels who fell away to follow Lucifer, now called Satan, the Accuser. 

Our very core nature was corrupted by Satan's lies, introducing distrust and disobedience into the Garden of Eden, so that with each generation, it gets a little harder to reach for faith. That's why God put his grace, also, into the picture so that we could summon the will to respond; and why He decided that faith, despite all of the corruption and suffering, would be accounted to us as righteousness. Just because we have been chosen, and in turn, we choose to respond, God has promised to restore our human nature to its original pristine condition, and remake us into Heavenly beings. 

We do not see the entirety of his plan, but we can rest assured that his will is inevitable, and it will demonstrate his glory despite any resistance from the fallen rebels. In the course of time, with the development of history, we have seen several movements of God's plan for our salvation. At first, He may have appeared uncompromising and too judgemental, but always there would remain an undercurrent of restraint and the promise of mercy. God hoped that we could be led by example, or at least deterred by threats of justice. But when He was forced to punish sinners or lose credibility, He chose mercy. Even when He had to draw back from us, as his holiness was repulsed by sin, He still loved us enough to send his Son into the world, to show us the Way.

We can see the incremental changes of policy in how God has dealt with fallen humanity written in the Bible, especially in Genesis. Later, the story progresses through the people of Israel and then outward, to eventually embrace the whole world. It would appear that God occasionally rethinks his policy of responses to steer history in the direction He wants it to go, but it is more likely that his plan has clearly defined steps that we simply cannot anticipate. In a way, it's like a chess game that God is playing with Satan, and his moves are not revealing the plan until the final play brings checkmate and humiliation. 

Let us review these moves through history to see how God's plan develops:

I. Adam and Eve - Disgrace 

   Although we were created to live in innocence and walk beside God in the Garden of Eden, we fell from grace. All of humanity was cursed for their lack of trust in God. They disobeyed a single simple command. So, they were exiled from his Presence, and the Garden, to eventually suffer mortality, just like the other beasts.

II. Noah - Wrath 

   All people are judged to be wicked, willfully pursuing their own standards of good and evil, despite warnings. God sent the Flood to destroy their whole civilization. Only one man listened, and his family was saved.

III. Babel - Scattering 

   The Flood survivors chose to rebuild their rebellious civilization, bigger and stronger, building a huge temple to try and put God in a box. God scattered them across the Earth and divided them by splitting their languages.

IV. Abraham and Lot - Choosing 

   The tribes in the Middle East coalesce again into city states. In their pride, they prosper and debauch themselves with unrestrained lusts and sin. God calls out a few who will listen, then makes an example of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. 

V. Moses and the Chosen - Discipline 

   After rescuing a group of slaves from oppression, God knits them together as his own nation, and gives them a law to follow. When they obey, He blesses them; when they defy Him, they're punished. When a king shows Him love, he receives a great promise. The Jews become an example before the world of God's justice and merciful discipline, and He always saves a remnant. 

VI. Jesus the Messiah - Mercy 

   Observing that including those with stiff-necks and hard hearts will always spoil the nation, God decides to select out the ones willing to repent and learn to follow. God chose to become a human being, to fully experience and overcome the human condition, so that those who would put their faith in Him could be saved. He sacrificed Himself to break the curse from Eden, so that sin could be forgiven, and reconciled those who would desire an intimate walk in discipleship with Him. Then He did the "impossible" and came back from the grave! When He departed, Jesus gave us the Holy Spirit for the renewal of our hearts and minds, and to lead us to fullness of Truth.

VII. The Church - Renewal 

   Christians are a called-out community of believers. We have been given the Holy Spirit, and are expected to behave with exemplary morality. Failures are expected, but those who don't try to follow Jesus and love one another are "tares among the wheat." They are not truly his disciples, despite however "religious" they appear. We have been commissioned to take the Gospel to all nations, call new believers, and try to build a kingdom of those loyal to God shaped by faith in his Son and his Word. It hasn't been easy, and the results have been less than we hoped, but the fullness of God's timing may be rising like the dawn. 

VIII. The Kingdom - Reign 

   We are waiting for Jesus to return as our immortal Divine King. He will humble the rebellious nations and destroy their armies arrayed against Israel. Then He will inaugurate his perfect Kingdom, which will last for 1,000 years. It is prophesied in the Bible, and we know that God always fulfills his promises.

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