I was thinking about the way people struggle with the "fairness" of God. The way that he heals some and not others. That he appears to bless some and not others. That he allows pain and horror for some while others coast. That the beautiful pain free life ahead, will only be for some - that you must choose him for it to be yours.
All of these struggles are real and understandable. But I guess what I've come to understand is this. Railing against him is like being furious at gravity for existing - for holding us down when we might love to be flying with birds! How do they get to enjoy such freedom while we are bound to the earth??
God is who he is. He never changes. He is no different in any universe he's created. But here we fight against him. He created our world - as any other - with laws of physics and relationship that make it all work together for the good of us all! But we chose to do it our way instead.
We broke it. And we're wearing the naturally occurring consequences of that breakage. While we may not personally have created the specific circumstances that are attacking our very core, we have definitely contributed to the chaos that was never intended, that now takes control. While we shake our fists at him, we are the ones responsible!!
What he did do was this - he ached for our suffering, and endured his own to set us free from it!!! How's that for fairness??? God - the epitome of love, goodness, kindness, peace, joy, forgiveness, patience - all those beautiful qualities, who has never done wrong in his life! - came to take all our guilt upon himself! So we didn't have to wear it! So death wouldn't have its final claim of us!!
He died and broke through to the other side to give us back the life that we do not deserve!!! But to have it, we have to be absorbed into the life of Jesus - God with us - so he can walk us beyond the grave. And it's no good bringing those through who don't choose his way of life, or all that brokenness will just take over again!
God is not being "unfair"! He's giving the most incredible and undeserved gift!!! The "judgement" is just the acknowledgement of whether we've received that gift or not! The rest is natural consequence - the result of breaking laws that were designed to work all things together for good!! Like if we'd broken free of gravity so we could fly - only to be lost into the emptiness of space for eternity.
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