Janet's Thoughts on 'As You Judge'
What a joy to know the truth, and the truth set the heart free and sanctified! (John 17:17). I, like many of us I think, have had many thoughts regarding the day of judgment: how every knee shall bow down before God and books be opened, there will be weighing of rights and wrongs therefore determining which side one will go (heaven or hell)…this brought so many questions to my mind. Who will be the Judge, God or Christ? How will the judgement process be? Where will it take place? How many judgements are there? Etc.
One day I asked Allan one of these questions and as he answered, he referred me to the book As You Judge. He offered me a hardcopy, and since then the book became part of me. Having the question why is judgement necessary first of all, I learnt that God is just and He has given us His will and guidelines. Therefore, it’s up to us to choose since the power of will has fully been given to us. Knowing God’s character, I was wondering and asking myself, will God or Jesus be the Judge as Daniel 7:9-10 brings out the court scene?
As we read (John 8:22), the Father judges no one and in (John 8:15), Jesus judges no one. Therefore, who will be the judge? My question was well answered by the text in (Mathew 7:1,2) that ‘’I myself will be the judge’’.
The book became more interesting since I was assured that all of my questions will be answered. Now having the knowledge that I will be my own judge, I asked myself, where will be the record of everything? Definitely the 12th chapter of the book As you Judge answered me clearly. The following excerpt shows how this record is kept so that we “reap what we sow,” which will be our own destruction if we don’t respond to God’s efforts to speak to our conscience.
When we have blessed experiences the memories are sweet, but when we do things that violate the sacred relationships we have with God and each other these things are recorded with a pen of iron.
The sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron; with the point of a diamond it is engraved on the tablet of their heart, and on the horns of your altars. —Jeremiah 17:1
The word for diamond actually means a pricking thorn like the prick of our conscience. Why is it written with a pen of iron? When our conscience is pricked with the thought that we are doing something wrong, if we proceed, our actions are scarred into our hearts with the feelings of guilt. At the same time the scarring of sin hardens our hearts and we become less sensitive to sin. The more we sin, the harder our hearts become, till our hearts become like iron completely.
We remember that these things are written into our hearts by the finger of God. We are the ones performing the actions, but the Spirit of God has designed a system that everything is written into us. God designed this system to bless us so that our sweet memories of good would always be with us. He did not design us to carry memories of sorrow and guilt. But when we sin, the pleadings of the Spirit of God that are rejected are written into our memories. The more we resist the pleading of the Spirit, the harder our hearts become till we can become like Pharaoh whose heart was completely hardened, meaning utterly unreceptive to the Spirit of God.
As You Judge, Chapter 12
As I have been seeking knowledge about judgement, God has been faithful in teaching me through the Bible and this great book. Reading the book of (Isaiah 55:8), this brought me into a conclusion that the Judgement process we see here on earth is totally different from God’s judgement.
The ways of God are not our ways, therefore, our way of doing things is totally different. This has brought me to learn about different types of judgement. My big question was on the investigative judgement. Why does God need to investigate, yet He is all knowing? I was lightened by the word that He is faithful and just and wants us to see and accept that we have gone astray to His will. Indeed, lots of my questions got answered. The judgement lessons, which are part of God’s character message, are important to all and God’s desire is for everyone to know His character.
God is love, and He created us, therefore He is not in a position to hurt us: He sees that alone we will lead ourselves to destruction, so He seeks, as a loving Father, to save us. He didn’t give us His law so that we can break it and subject us to punishment, but rather as a hedge of protection to put us in harmony with how He created the universe.
https://characterofgod.org/gospel-models-law/
The saints did not rely on their merits to put themselves right with the law, but had learned to trust Christ alone to direct them into living in spirit and truth. As Christ is preparing us for a great time of trouble ahead of us, let us put our trust in Him. When we do that, we shall come forth from the time of trouble sealed in the truth that God will never condemn us, choosing to accept His loving judgement instead of our own condemning judgement, which we do and therefore think God does. Amen
Learning all this, my desire is to teach and spread the concept of God’s loving judgement. Do you have any question concerning judgement? As Ye Judge is the best answer. Satan has brought deception concerning Gods character, but Christ came to reveal His Father to us. Therefore, let us lift Him up and He will draw all men unto Him. John 12:32. Amen
Blessings.
