Sinners

“Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say, “I will take revenge; I will pay them back,” says the Lord. Instead, “If your enemies are hungry, feed them. If they are thirsty, give them something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals of shame on their heads.””
Romans 12:19-20 NLT

Paul follows on from his previous theme of not responding to evil with more evil. He warns his readers that they should never take revenge, instead leaving room for God to deal with the perpetrators of evil. It should be noted that God will get angry with them, as He does with all sinners. And He has promised to deal with these evildoers.

Paul quoted two Scriptures in the verses from Romans 12 . The first is from Deuteronomy 32:34-35, “The Lord says, ‘Am I not storing up these things, sealing them away in my treasury? I will take revenge; I will pay them back. In due time their feet will slip. Their day of disaster will arrive, and their destiny will overtake them’”. God may not deal with those who commit evil acts straight away, even though we might want Him to, but He has promised to take a careful note and put it somewhere safe in His “treasury”. There is no escape for those who commit evil acts, because one day they will have to account for their behaviour. No deed ever committed will go unpunished. So that crime committed against an old lady, for example, that roused such indignation in the community, will catch up with the perpetrator one day. The books being stored in God’s “treasury” will one day be opened and the video of what really happened will be replayed before everyone. Imagine the shame! But, worse, will come the verdict – Guilty!

Some people struggle with the thought that God gets angry. Well, Jesus did. Not often but we read in Mark 3:5, “He looked around at them in anger and, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts, said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ He stretched it out, and his hand was completely restored”. Jesus was angry with the irrational and misguided responses of the Pharisees in the synagogue, but note that, although He had the power to zap them on the spot, He moved on and healed a man with a withered hand. Those Pharisees were in for trouble, because God made a note of their evil response to His Son. Jesus was angry, yet in His anger He didn’t sin.

The second Old Testament Paul quoted came from Provers 25:21-22, “If your enemies are hungry, give them food to eat. If they are thirsty, give them water to drink. You will heap burning coals of shame on their heads, and the Lord will reward you”. How does that work? In God’s Kingdom, there are a different set of rules applying. Whereas in our earthly kingdoms, our enemies will be locked up, and their malevolent intentions suppressed, in God’s Kingdom, we citizens treat our enemies with respect and compassion. We provide them with the basics of life, food and water, and show them kindness when none is deserved. That’s hard! It goes against everything we feel inside. But that is what God has asked us to do. Imagine a world where every evil act received such a kind, loving and compassionate response. There wouldn’t be much evil remaining for long.

There is a battle raging against Christians in the West, around the gender ideologies. And the proponents of this evil want to close the churches who resist their wayward demands, demands that are in direct conflict with what the Bible says. We could join or organise the marches, the rallies, and write angry banners, or we could pray for them with compassion for their confusion. We gently make our views known to our politicians, expounding the love that we have. And as Peter wrote in 1 Peter 4:8b, “ … for love covers a multitude of sins”. I know that this verse was meant for Christians, but the principle remains.

Paul wrote that there was a partnership between God and His followers. We respond to evil well and without sin. He will bring the punishment on those who sin against us. That is God’s way, and, by following it, we will truly conquer the evil that is so prevalent in our communities and nations. Small steps accumulate. Short prayers are answered. And we pilgrims will one day experience the reward promised us.

Dear God. You promised to deal with evildoers. That takes a lot of pressure from us, because we don’t have to. Thank You. Amen.

“But people are counted as righteous, not because of their work, but because of their faith in God who forgives sinners. David also spoke of this when he described the happiness of those who are declared righteous without working for it: “Oh, what joy for those whose disobedience is forgiven, whose sins are put out of sight. Yes, what joy for those whose record the Lord has cleared of sin.””
Romans 4:5-8 NLT

It is an amazing and counter cultural fact that we receive the currency of Heaven without having to work for it. In God’s economy, “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23) but those who put their faith in God are rewarded with the most valuable currency ever invented – righteousness in God’s sight. So it is not surprising that David expressed his “joy for those whose record the Lord has cleared of sin”.

It is easy to put our faith and forgiveness on the back burner, because we think to ourselves that Paul’s verses on faith and righteousness, death or forgiveness, will only happen after we pass from this life. But nothing could be further from the truth. Paul quoted the first two verses from the Davidic Psalm 32. But the next two verses are important. We read in Psalm 32:3-4, “When I refused to confess my sin, my body wasted away, and I groaned all day long. Day and night your hand of discipline was heavy on me. My strength evaporated like water in the summer heat.” This is reality and increasingly our medical professionals find links between our personal sinful state and our physical and mental wellbeing. God never designed us to carry a heavy load of sin. The sad thing is that so many people try and deal with their sins by visiting a psychiatrist or therapist, in the forlorn hope that in that way they will gain peace of mind. But nothing could be further from the truth. A sticking plaster approach to fixing our sins doesn’t work. There is only one remedy, and that is to have “faith in God who forgives sinners”.

A clear conscience is the remedy for the problem that David wrote about. After suffering much physically for his state of unconfessed sin, David wrote in the next verse in Psalm 32, “Finally, I confessed all my sins to you and stopped trying to hide my guilt. I said to myself, “I will confess my rebellion to the Lord.” And you forgave me! All my guilt is gone“. And I can just imagine David jumping around in gleeful abandon, as he wrote the last verse in this Psalm, “So rejoice in the Lord and be glad, all you who obey him! Shout for joy, all you whose hearts are pure!”

In Psalm 32:6, David wrote down a warning about the urgency of dealing with, and that means the confession of, our sins, before God. We read, “Therefore, let all the godly pray to you while there is still time, that they may not drown in the floodwaters of judgment“. I read this morning about the sad and sudden death of Jeff Beck from bacterial meningitis. He was one of the guitar greats of all time for his particular genre of music, rock and blues. I don’t know where he stood in relation to God, but the suddenness of his death highlights the urgency of getting right with Him, while there is still time. Remember, somebody adopting the default position of failing to get right before God will mean ending up in a lost eternity. We don’t know how long we have left in this life, whether young or old. But we do know the One who knows.

Dear Father God. We confess our sins before You today, and are grateful for Your forgiveness. We worship You today. Amen.

Revenge

God Forgives Sinners