Getting Closer to Jesus: We live in a culture that despises the notion of judgment on any level. In particular, we aren’t comfortable with an angry God. People prefer a tame God to a dangerous one. As Dorothy Sayers aptly put it, “We have declawed the lion of Judah and made him a housecat for pale priests and pious old ladies.”

I don’t blame people for that. But if we are to be faithful to the authority of the Scripture, then we will have to acknowledge that God hates sin, which is morally offensive to his nature. Therefore, it is only right and just that he judges the unrepentant sinner who persists in breaking his moral law.

The sobering reality is that God’s righteous wrath will be poured out on sinful humanity someday in the future. When people die in their sinful state, there is a literal hell that awaits them, a physical place where they will suffer the eternal wrath of God. Likewise, scripture is very clear that one day, at the end of the age, the Great White Throne judgment of God (Revelation 20, Romans 2:5-6) will mark the final end of sin, when Satan, evil systems, and all the wicked will be cast into the lake of fire forever.

Obviously, that is a boatload of bad news! Yet amazingly, because of the immutable character of our gracious and merciful God, even within the bad news there is good news—Good News that should cause our hearts to explode in grateful praise. We can escape judgment!

You see, God’s righteous wrath for mankind’s sin was satisfied at Calvary when Jesus suffered and died as the final sacrifice for our sins. God fully focused his judgment against sinful man on his sinless Son, Jesus, as his hung on the cross. In the greatest act of grace and mercy ever, Jesus bore the wrath of God for the sins of the world when he was crucified”

“He himself bore our sins” in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; “by his wounds you have been healed.” (1 Peter 2:24)

Jesus is very clear that when a person puts believing or saving faith in who he is (God in the flesh) and in what he was sent to do (die as the redeeming sacrifice for the sins of the world) and personally trusts that he rose from the dead as Lord of life, then that believing person gets a pass on the worst, most dreadful, persistent fear—in this case, a reality-based fear: The fear of dying and facing the judgment of God.

For sure, it can be quite discouraging to hear about a God who actually punishes sin. And yes, we can understand why our culture wants to deny the reality of any kind of judgment. Yet anyone—yes, anyone—can take heart, despite that reality, there stands at the center of Divine wrath the grace and mercy of a God so loving that he willingly sacrificed his only Son so that the guilt of sin could be erased from our account.

And that includes you, me, and anyone else who will surrender to Jesus in believing faith. As Jesus said two chapters previously, “God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him would not die but have eternal life.”

Obviously, there is a reason that John 3:16 is the most well-loved verse in the entire Bible.

Take the Next Step: When you are in conversations with people who don’t believe in Jesus—and even with some who claim faith in Christ—it is likely that at some of those you  encounter will be of  the “no judgment” mindset. Try to represent this Truth when that happens: Yes, there is a judgment coming, but there is also an escape clause that God has built into his righteous obligation to judge sin—saving faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. That really is Good News!