True Worship - Rumor notes 134

 Revelation 14

6 I saw an angel flying in mid heaven, having an eternal Good News to proclaim to those who dwell on the earth, and to every nation, tribe, language, and people. 7 He said with a loud voice, "Fear the Lord, and give him glory; for the hour of his judgment has come. Worship him who made the heaven, the earth, the sea, and the springs of waters!"

Worship him who made the heaven, the earth, the sea, and the springs of waters

In context of what has just been discussed about judging God and the effects that can have on our perceptions and relationship to Him in our own lives, this call to worship Him simply amplifies what has already been exposed. To worship means to look to a source to define who we are, our identity, our purpose and sense of value and to show us how we fit in with everyone around us. Who we allow to define how to act like ourselves becomes the object of our worship. Worship has to do with worth, and worth involves how we value ourselves and feel worthy to receive attention, interest, affection and who we choose to trust. Worship involves who or what we love most, make our highest priority, receive what we believe will satisfy our longings and who or what shapes our character.

Worship also involves release of our authority. When we understand the true nature of authority as God designed it, worship takes on a whole new dimension in our relationship with God. Most people imagine that God's authority must be viewed as completely sovereign, meaning we are to live in fear of His awesome power that might be used to severely punish or destroy us if we do not follow the right protocols to prevent His wrath from falling on us. Yet all of this is actually worship as defined by the dragon, not the kind of worship and authority that God desires. For actual authority has been delegated out by God, entrusted to each one of us. It is embodied in our freedom to choose for ourselves whom we will serve, whom we will desire, admire, want to become like, pursue and use as our model and hero to become like. Thus true authority is released by us to empower either God or the dragon to have access to our heart, mind, spirit, soul and body that shapes us into their image.

In the previous verses we learned about how the 144,000 group obsess with following the Lamb wherever He goes. This is worship, and every one of us worship in one way or another. Those who choose to worship God as this angel calls us to do, come to desire to become completely reflective of the disposition and mindset the Lamb exhibits. They come to see that God is completely like the Lamb, and they desire to reflect that glory without resistance in their own lives and be transformed into His image and likeness. They sing praises to the Lamb, they dress like the Lamb, they think and react and love like the Lamb until their characters are so set into the Lamb's way of living that nothing will ever be able to alter their passion to live forever in the presence of the Lamb with joy unspeakable and full of glory. (See quote at the end of this document.)

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to his great mercy became our father again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an incorruptible and undefiled inheritance that doesn't fade away, reserved in Heaven for you, who by the power of God are guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. Wherein you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been put to grief in various trials, that the proof of your faith, which is more precious than gold that perishes even though it is tested by fire, may be found to result in praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ – whom not having known you love; in whom, though now you don't see him, yet believing, you rejoice greatly with joy unspeakable and full of glory – receiving the result of your faith, the salvation [healing transformation] of your souls. (1 Peter 1:3-9)

This is true worship, and it puts God's judgment in a new light, for judgment is what we do, not what God does to us. We are given the role of judging God, and we are called to do so by worshiping Him as worthy of our own trust, admiration, allegiance and as our Source of joy. As we continue to do this we reflect Him and become more and more like Him until we are fitted to enter the glorious presence of His unveiled passion to experience joy as never before. By worshiping the One who created us and everything around us, we are reintegrated back into our unique place in His circuit of love by consenting to allow Him to restore us to our design for intimate relationship with Him at the maximum level of capacity for joy. This introduces a whole different perspective to this message about judgment than most of us have ever imagined.

This is the kind of worship glimpsed in chapters 4 and 5 where we watch with amazement as the entire universe is caught up in ecstasy and wonder over the greatness of God that is beyond comprehension. Such worship is saturated with appreciation of His true character and views His actions as only revealing love despite the distortions affecting how He has been viewed historically. As the unfolding truth about Him continues to expand through revelations of the Lamb as laid out in chapter 5 and the rest of this book, praise, honor and awe increases until at last darkness can no longer obscure or deny it, and every sentient being in the universe comes to conclude that God is true and right, and in no way has He ever been devious or complicit with the ways of darkness.

Note the contrast between the motives for worship of the beast and the dragon in the previous chapter, to the motives for worshipping the true God listed here. The dragon relies on threats of punishment, violence and death to elicit worship, the exact opposite of giving life more abundantly.

When the living creatures give glory, honor, and thanks to him who sits on the throne, to him who lives forever and ever, the twenty-four elders fall down before him who sits on the throne, and worship him who lives forever and ever, and throw their crowns before the throne, saying, "Worthy are you, our Lord and God, the Holy One, to receive the glory, the honor, and the power, for you created all things, and because of your desire they existed, and were created!" (Revelation 4:9-11)

The four living creatures said, "Amen!" The elders fell down and worshiped. (Revelation 5:14)

All the angels were standing around the throne, the elders, and the four living creatures; and they fell on their faces before his throne, and worshiped God, (Revelation 7:11)

The twenty-four elders, who sit on their thrones before God's throne, fell on their faces and worshiped God, saying: "We give you thanks, Lord God, the Almighty, the one who is and who was; because you have taken your great power, and reigned. The nations were angry, and your wrath came, as did the time for the dead to be judged, and to give your bondservants the prophets, their reward, as well as to the saints, and those who fear your name, to the small and the great; and to destroy those who destroy the earth." (Revelation 11:16-18)

He said to me, "Write, 'Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.'" He said to me, "These are true words of God." I fell down before his feet to worship him. He said to me, "Look! Don't do it! I am a fellow bondservant with you and with your brothers who hold the testimony of Jesus. Worship God, for the testimony of Jesus is the Spirit of Prophecy." (Revelation 19:9-10)

Now I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. When I heard and saw, I fell down to worship before the feet of the angel who had shown me these things. He said to me, "See you don't do it! I am a fellow bondservant with you and with your brothers, the prophets, and with those who keep the words of this book. Worship God." (Revelation 22:8-9)

What caused John to impulsively fall down to worship his angel attendant? Understand that the nature of worship is looking to a source to define us, yet the only valid Source for anyone to worship is the One who has inherent life and for whom all creation is designed to reflect. This angel had personal experience observing the fallout from what had transpired after the highest created angel in the universe started to solicit and later even to demand worship from other created beings. John's escort knew firsthand the tragic consequences of misdirected worship, so he was highly sensitive to the dangers of receiving worship that belonged solely to God. No angel can create or provide the power of life to anyone like the Godhead does, so to allow a human being to focus their worship on a created angel was like tempting the angel to indulge in the very sin that was part of the downfall of Lucifer, and this angel guide wanted nothing to do with that. He did not want John to mistake his angel guide as being somehow more important or valuable than John himself as a human being. They were fellow servants, meaning they were equals from heaven's perspective, and John needed to be reminded of that in order to avoid slipping into angel worship simply out of awe of the advantages of power and perspective they can use to serve us here on earth.

Again, when he brings in the firstborn into the world he says, "Let all the angels of God worship him." (Hebrews 1:6)

We must be extremely careful to not allow any other being, natural or supernatural, to define who we are or who we reflect other than the Ones who created us in Their image. To do so is to worship a false god in place of God, and our Creator who designed us to find our true fulfillment and greatest joy through fellowship and intimacy with His heart of passionate love, is very jealous for our highest affections, not because there are any other legitimate options competing with Him but because He does not want any of His children to be lost, for it grieves His heart when we are seduced into seeking fulfillment from inferior sources that only exploit us and rob us of our inheritance as children of our Father in heaven.

for you shall worship no other god: for Yahweh, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God. (Exodus 34:14)

He said to him, "I will give you all of these things, if you will fall down and worship me." Then Jesus said to him, "Get behind me, Satan! For it is written, 'You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve.'" (Matthew 4:9-10)

You adulterers and adulteresses, don't you know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, "The Spirit who lives in us yearns jealously"? But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, "God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble." Be subject therefore to God. But resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded. (James 4:4-8)

You worship that which you don't know. We worship that which we know; for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour comes, and now is, when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such to be his worshippers. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth. (John 4:22-24)

How can we worship that which we don't know? We do it all the time, yet because we don't realize what worship is or how we worship substitute gods, we can be oblivious to how deeply involved we are in worship of lesser gods from how we were created to live reflecting the God of love.

Therefore God also gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to uncleanness, that their bodies should be dishonored among themselves, who exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. (Romans 1:24-25)

For many walk, of whom I often told you, and now tell you even weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite, and whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things. (Philippians 3:18-19 NAS95)

He spoke a parable to them, saying, "The ground of a certain rich man brought forth abundantly. He reasoned within himself, saying, 'What will I do, because I don't have room to store my crops?' He said, 'This is what I will do. I will pull down my barns, and build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. I will tell my soul, "Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years. Take your ease, eat, drink, be merry."' (Luke 12:16-19)

Now I urge you, brethren, keep your eye on those who cause dissensions and hindrances contrary to the teaching which you learned, and turn away from them. For such men are slaves, not of our Lord Christ but of their own appetites; and by their smooth and flattering speech they deceive the hearts of the unsuspecting. (Romans 16:17-18 NAS95)

Don't love the world, neither the things that are in the world. If anyone loves the world, the Father's love isn't in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, isn't the Father's, but is the world's. The world is passing away with its lusts, but he who does God's will remains forever. (1 John 2:15-17)

Idolatry is simply choosing other sources as gods to define our identity, worth, and who to emulate.

Lust means that we want something very intensely and we want it immediately to the point of violating healthy principles and freedom. We are willing to seize something we crave at the expense of integrity. Lust is perverted natural desires supercharged with demonic zeal that can transform something beautiful into a tragedy by subverting our free will to indulge in harmful activity and relationships rather than living in harmony with life-giving principles guided by the Spirit of God.

Lust of the flesh involves looking for satisfaction and fulfillment through sensory stimulation of the bodies nervous system physically. This can come in many varieties under this category of lust related to the literal flesh as well as the fallen nature of humanity. One example of this is appetite, for while a healthy appetite is certainly not sinful, when we allow food or drink or mind-altering substances or other ingestible products to hijack our will, we become slaves to our appetite and allow demonic spirits to hold us hostage in habits and impulsive addictions that debilitate our physical capacity to think and reason and be in health.

Another example is lust for sexual stimulation in all its myriad forms. Again, sex inherently is not evil, for God designed it as an introduction to the kind of intimacy we are created to experience with the divine. Yet this important asset gifted to humans is exploited by the enemy of our souls who does everything possible to distort, abuse, exploit and entangle it with fear, violence and shame. This defaces the image of God in His children on earth. Lust debases sex into self-gratification rather than a mutual celebration of God's design for expanding agape life.

Lust of the eyes is not merely an obsession with looking for natural beauty. Again, God designed us to appreciate and enjoy the beautiful, but lust involves exploiting beauty in ways to deceive, to seduce others with temptations to violate integrity and ignore the principles of love and truth and freedom. This can involve exploiting inherent natural beauty gifted to individuals to attract increased attention from others, to draw as many eyes as possible to gaze at them or what they can produce in order to build up a sense of worth based on externals. Lust of the flesh and lust of the eyes are mated to strengthen each other while bringing to ruin those on both sides of that equation.

Pride of life has to do with denial that our identity and worth comes only and directly from God. Pride involves attempting to fill the void created deep inside our psyche from this disconnect from God by distrust and unbelief. Pride surrounds us with substitutes designed to elicit admiration, respect and honor from others to create a sense of value and importance. Pride is not limited to religious arrogance but infects most all humanity because it reflects the disposition of the originator of sin. Lucifer came to imagine his value was rooted in his superior capacities, thinking they inherently made him better than everyone else. This was because he came to deny that all he had was entrusted to him as gifts by his creator. The result was pride that caused him to abuse his gifts and denigrate the principles of love defining God's kingdom that interfered with his agenda to exalt himself.

You said in your heart, "I will ascend into heaven! I will exalt my throne above the stars of God! I will sit on the mountain of assembly, in the far north! I will ascend above the heights of the clouds! I will make myself like the Most High!" (Isaiah 14:13-14)

Pride is artificial identity constructed from external attributes, achievements or acquired wealth that attempts to both fill and hide the emptiness resulting from unbelief in God as the only source of worth.

behold, you are wiser than Daniel; there is no secret that is hidden from you; by your wisdom and by your understanding you have gotten you riches, and have gotten gold and silver into your treasures; by your great wisdom and by your traffic have you increased your riches, and your heart is lifted up because of your riches-- (Ezekiel 28:3-5)

The reason we are considering all these things is because they are directly related to this first angel's message calling all to look back to our Origin as the only source from which we can receive life, identity and find our true value apart from any other venue or substitute. Sin subverts the truth about our relationship and total dependence on God for everything. Thus our greatest need in order to enter into life again is to worship the God of love who created everything and everyone. This requires turning our attention away from ourselves, our efforts to impress others, our false reasoning that worth and identity is derived from what we do or what we have, to worship the One who alone is fully trustworthy, the One who is only love, light and truth and who alone can save us from our sins.

All the children of Israel looked on, when the fire came down, and the glory of Yahweh was on the house; and they bowed themselves with their faces to the ground on the pavement, and worshiped, and gave thanks to Yahweh, saying, For he is good; for his loving kindness endures for ever. (2 Chronicles 7:3)

Worship Yahweh in holy array. Tremble before him, all the earth. Say among the nations, "Yahweh reigns." The world is also established. It can't be moved. He will judge the peoples with equity. Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice. Let the sea roar, and its fullness! Let the field and all that is in it exult! Then all the trees of the woods shall sing for joy before Yahweh; for he comes, for he comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world with righteousness, the peoples with his truth. (Psalms 96:9-13)

The God who made the world and all things in it, he, being Lord of heaven and earth, doesn't dwell in temples made with hands, neither is he served by men's hands, as though he needed anything, seeing he himself gives to all life and breath, and all things. He made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the surface of the earth, having determined appointed seasons, and the boundaries of their dwellings, that they should seek the Lord, if perhaps they might reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. 'For in him we live, and move, and have our being.' As some of your own poets have said, 'For we are also his offspring.' Being then the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold, or silver, or stone, engraved by art and design of man. The times of ignorance therefore God overlooked. But now he commands that all people everywhere should repent, because he has appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom he has ordained; of which he has given assurance to all men, in that he has raised him from the dead." (Acts 17:24-31)

There are key issues identified in this passage we should pay attention to. First, the God of heaven created everything and everyone; there is no one else that can legitimately claim this. That means He owns everything and everyone simply because He is our origin. He is Creator, and to deny that is to challenge our own existence. Satan cannot claim that he created us, for he knows that would be so absurd it would easily expose him as a fraud. Yet he undermines this truth with specious theories such as evolution that leads millions to distrust God and to even doubt His existence.

What is more effective is to lead us to imagine God relates to us through the system of relative relationships as invented by Satan, the system of trading and exchange. When this paradigm defines how we relate, we imagine that God expects worship and service in exchange for providing for our needs. This is where the subtle nature of Satan's deceptions gain traction and how he is able to get us to worship alternative gods that operate within his system of social hierarchy.

Any god who can be influenced, leveraged or manipulated by gifts, sacrifices or acts of obedience are foreign to God's design for creation reflective of His character. Paul points out that God has no needs; God doesn't need a place to live, so building a temple or house for Him to live in from heaven's perspective is nonsensical. Additionally, God already owns everything, and because He is Spirit He has no need to eat physical food, so attempting to entice or bribe Him with gifts of food or sex or anything that appeals to humans is likewise absurd. Yet all of these things have infiltrated our perceptions about God and is how pagans relate to their pantheon of gods. Sadly these same notions have infiltrated Christian teachings about what God expects or demands from His subjects.

When we believe that God takes offense when we sin or fail to perfectly obey His laws and commands, that is a sure sign we view God as relating to us in the mindset of the trading system invented by Lucifer. An offense is the equivalent of a debt, and according to that system all debts and credits must be zeroed out to balance each other out, whether in the financial arena or in the emotional realm. This concept of zero-sum accounting permeates all of Satan's counterfeit kingdom while the means of motivating people are enticements of reward and fear of punishment.

The notion that God becomes angry or offended when others don't do what He wants originates with the gods of this world. It is a most sinister and subtle deception designed to keep us enslaved to fear and easily manipulated by those under the dragon's influence. Paul in his speech to pagans points out that the God who created all of us as one single family, is not at all influenced or swayed by our attempts to relate to Him transactionally like pagan gods demand. Rather we were created for fulfillment through intimacy grow to know the love that alone brings real fulfillment for our cravings to thrive in joy, peace and love. This defines the deepest craving of every human heart, but these cravings have been hijacked and manipulated by the enemy with lies about why we feel them in the first place and where to find satisfaction.

...that they should seek the Lord, if perhaps they might reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us.

This intimacy with our Father who created us can be glimpsed throughout history. This is the kind of worship God wants from us, free of all fear, shame or dark feelings about Him.

For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says Yahweh, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you hope in your latter end. You shall call on me, and you shall go and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You shall seek me, and find me, when you shall search for me with all your heart. (Jeremiah 29:11-13)

For thus says Yahweh to the house of Israel: "Seek me, and you will live..." (Amos 5:4)

But Israel shall be saved by Yahweh with an everlasting salvation: you shall not be disappointed nor confounded world without end. For thus says Yahweh who created the heavens, the God who formed the earth and made it, who established it and didn't create it a waste, who formed it to be inhabited: I am Yahweh; and there is no one else. I have not spoken in secret, in a place of the land of darkness; I didn't say to the seed of Jacob, Seek you me in vain: I, Yahweh, speak righteousness, I declare things that are right. Assemble yourselves and come; draw near together, you who have escaped from the nations: they have no knowledge who carry the wood of their engraved image, and pray to a god that can't save. Declare you, and bring it forth; yes, let them take counsel together: who has shown this from ancient time? who has declared it of old? Haven't I, Yahweh? and there is no God else besides me, a just God and a Savior; there is no one besides me. Look to me, and be you saved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is none else. (Isaiah 45:17-22)

Therefore don't be anxious, saying, 'What will we eat?', 'What will we drink?' or, 'With what will we be clothed?' For the Gentiles seek after all these things, for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first God's Kingdom, and his righteousness; and all these things will be given to you as well. (Matthew 6:31-33)

For what great nation is there, that has a god so near to them, as Yahweh our God is whenever we call on him? (Deuteronomy 4:7)

The anger of Yahweh shall not return, until he has executed, and until he have performed the intents of his heart: in the latter days you shall understand it perfectly. I sent not these prophets, yet they ran: I didn't speak to them, yet they prophesied. But if they had stood in my council, then had they caused my people to hear my words, and had turned them from their evil way, and from the evil of their doings. Am I a God at hand, says Yahweh, and not a God afar off? Can any hide himself in secret places so that I shall not see him? says Yahweh. Don't I fill heaven and earth? says Yahweh. (Jeremiah 23:20-24)

This is the polar opposite of the kind of worship that transforms people into acting like demons. Selfishness, lust for power, greed, pride along with hatred, shame, condemnation and worldly justice all come from imagining that God is more like the beast rather than purely like the Lamb. This is what is unmasked in chapter 13, but here we see its counterpart in this angel's invitation to have our hearts realigned to know the One whose power alone saves us from our sins through the revelation of His graciousness, kindness and love.

This highlights the core issue of choice, the most powerful part about us we have been given. Each person is being brought to a point of decision as to what they will embrace as their concept of God and how He relates to them. The evidence of our choice is the way in which we relate to others.

Seek you Yahweh while he may be found; call you on him while he is near: let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return to Yahweh, and he will have mercy on him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. (Isaiah 55:6-7)

Additional notes:

In my ongoing study of Matthew 12 I am discovering more insights about this issue of worship and how much danger we can be in when it comes to our ideas and beliefs about worship. The Pharisees reacted violently when Jesus performed certain miracles involving exorcising demons that inhibited people from seeing or speaking, and especially when the title 'son of David' was invoked in connection to such miracles. King David, in the mind of the religiously and politically powerful in Jesus' day, was a hero they wanted to see replicated in triumphal accomplishments of the Messiah they put all their hopes in to forcibly rid them of the tyranny of Roman occupation. They thirsted for a powerful champion to launch a revolution similar to how David consolidated power in the many victories that culminated in the glory days of Solomon when their nation achieved a pinnacle of worldly honor.

The religious leaders in Jesus' day promoted the belief that the promised Messiah would restore them to a kingdom of earthly prestige and power once again, only this time their nation would rule the world forever as apparently prophesied in the Old Testament. Thus the title 'son of David' was linked closely with this vision of glory and power achieved by military might that would replicate David's exploits just as he conquered the giant against all odds at the outset of his career before becoming king.

Then one possessed by a demon, blind and mute, was brought to him and he healed him, so that the blind and mute man both spoke and saw. All the multitudes were amazed, and said, "Can this be the son of David?"

But when the Pharisees heard it, they said, "This man does not cast out demons, except by Beelzebul, the prince of the demons." (Matthew 12:22-24)

This confrontation has many nuances to it that would take too long to unpack here. However they are addressed in another document that is part of a series I am currently doing on Matthew 12, but I will try to summarize it briefly here.

When it says that this man delivered from demon possession was able to both speak and see after being healed, we find resonance in passages throughout Scripture linking seeing, speaking and hearing with the condition of the heart. The condition of this man symbolized the spiritual condition exposed in the light of the One who liberated this man trapped by demonic oppression.

A tradition originated in the story of David (2 Samuel 5:6-8) when he evicted the Jebusites and captured their city to make it his capital. This tradition was then passed down generationally all the way to Jesus' time. Even then the blind and the lame were considered cursed by God and deserving of 'just' punishment, so to heal such individuals was seen as defiance against clear judgments of God on people who deserved this condition. These stories in Jesus' life this phrase Son of David is elicited, when viewed from this perspective, makes those events more significant than simply a title tossed about loosely. In fact, Jesus' interactions with the blind and the lame were a direct challenge to the curse invoked by David as Jesus, the Son of David, came to revoke that curse from David.

Applying this title to Jesus incensed and aroused intense fury of religious leaders, causing them to fiercely accuse Him of being in league with the devil. Yet what actually was being exposed was the fact that their god very different from the Father God Jesus came to reveal, for their gods were anchored in their expectations of raw power from God in the Messiah they wanted Him to send.

What they were putting their hopes in to save them was little different than worshipping crude manufactured idols that they studiously avoided in their dogged pursuit of personal righteousness. Yet they, like so many yet today, failed to realize that strongly held traditions, dogmas and assertions about what God must do to save us can be an idol just as any carved image might be.

It is as easy to make an idol of false doctrines and theories as to fashion an idol of wood or stone. By misrepresenting the attributes of God, Satan leads men to conceive of Him in a false character. With many, a philosophical idol is enthroned in the place of Jehovah; while the living God, as He is revealed in His word, in Christ, and in the works of creation, is worshiped by but few. Thousands deify nature while they deny the God of nature. Though in a different form, idolatry exists in the Christian world today as verily as it existed among ancient Israel in the days of Elijah. The god of many professedly wise men, of philosophers, poets, politicians, journalists--the god of polished fashionable circles, of many colleges and universities, even of some theological institutions--is little better than Baal, the sun-god of Phoenicia. {GC 583.1}

No outward shrines may be visible, there may be no image for the eye to rest upon, yet we may be practicing idolatry. It is as easy to make an idol of cherished ideas or objects as to fashion gods of wood or stone. Thousands have a false conception of God and his attributes. They are as verily serving a false god as were the servants of Baal. Are we worshiping the true God as he is revealed in his word, in Christ, in nature, or are we adoring some philosophical idol enshrined in his place? God is a God of truth. Justice and mercy are the attributes of his throne. He is a God of love, of pity, and tender compassion. Thus he is represented in his Son, our Saviour. He is a God of patience and long-suffering. If such is the being whom we adore, and to whose character we are seeking to assimilate, we are worshiping the true God. {ST, Feb. 8, 1883 par. 2}

Righteous Judgment - Rumor notes 133

 Revelation 14

6 I saw an angel flying in mid heaven, having an eternal Good News to proclaim to those who dwell on the earth, and to every nation, tribe, language, and people. 7 He said with a loud voice, "Fear the Lord, and give him glory; for the hour of his judgment has come. Worship him who made the heaven, the earth, the sea, and the springs of waters!"

the hour of his judgment has come

God is not above being judged. To insist that the judge of the universe will not tolerate anyone judging Him while He is free to pass sentence and condemnation on others, induces immediate suspicion, and rightly so. We are created in the image of God and designed to grow up to become like Him in character. So when we harbor such sinister notions about God being exempt from being judged, yet free to execute judgments on others, that same disposition becomes reflected in our own heart and we become increasingly judgmental of others while blindly imagining we have nothing seriously wrong with our own condition. This is the condition of Laodicea and a symptom of immature perceptions about God that blinds us to our own desperate condition.

Because you say, 'I am rich, and have gotten riches, and have need of nothing;' and don't know that you are the wretched one, miserable, poor, blind, and naked; (Revelation 3:17)

I am fully aware that the language in Scripture is full of references to God executing judgments. The question that needs to be examined very carefully is this – what kind of judgments does God do, and even more probing, is God transparent, honest and willing to allow His own actions and motives to be fully investigated and judged? Or to put it another way, what is the difference between our presumptions about the meaning and practice of judgment and what Scripture calls righteous judgment?

I saw the heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and he who sat on it is called Faithful and True. In righteousness he judges and makes war. His eyes are a flame of fire, and on his head are many crowns. He has names written and a name written which no one knows but he himself. He is clothed in a garment sprinkled with blood. His name is called "The Word of God." The armies which are in heaven followed him on white horses, clothed in white, pure, fine linen. (Revelation 19:11-14)

If anyone listens to my sayings, and doesn't believe, I don't judge him. For I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. He who rejects me, and doesn't receive my sayings, has one who judges him. The word that I spoke, the same will judge him in the last day. (John 12:47-48)

What we have been learning for some time now is that part of what differentiates God's righteous kind of judgment from what we have assumed and practiced as judgment, is the disposition and motives on the part of the ones doing the judging.

Don't judge according to appearance, but judge righteous judgment. (John 7:24)

This is crucial to appreciate and apply to our understanding of judgment, particularly as we go through this final book of Scripture where a lot of judging is going on. Even those who are loyal to God often find it difficult to discern this principle, and we find this at the beginning of the chapter we just quoted highlighting how Jesus, the Word of God, only judges and makes war in righteousness.

After these things I heard something like a loud voice of a great multitude in heaven, saying, "Hallelujah! Salvation, power, and glory belong to our God: for true and righteous are his judgments. For he has judged the great prostitute, who corrupted the earth with her sexual immorality, and he has avenged the blood of his servants at her hand." (Revelation 19:1-2)

The things expressed in this song may be factual, yet in light of what can be learned from previous chapters, especially regarding the vitally important New Song mindset, the emphasizing God's victory over a most tenacious enemy is not in complete sync with the disposition of the New Song. This is why in verse 5 a voice from the throne invites them to do a restart so that the Song comes out clean and free of all negativity or hint of imposed punishments from God. I believe this is what a true understanding of righteous judgment actually means, for when the sentiments of the New Song become the sole motivation of all our praises for our heavenly Father, the way is prepared for a fuller revelation of God's heart untainted by subtle inferences that have for so long infected our spiritual perceptions.

This is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light; for their works were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the light, and doesn't come to the light, lest his works would be exposed. But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his works may be revealed, that they have been done in God. (John 3:19-21)

Light represents the real truth in contrast to our false perceptions, opinions, feelings and assertions about what is real and true. This light originates in a righteousness that is not in tension with the Law, yet is distinct and apart from any righteousness defined by keeping the Law. This has been a point of confusion and endless arguing for centuries, yet it also is directly connected to our confusion about the nature of judgment, for judging and law-keeping are almost always directly linked with each other. Thus an appreciation and understanding of righteous judgment in contrast to judgments based on appearances based on using law in the way we use them, is vitally linked to perceiving and appreciating how God's righteousness is not tied to or defined by His keeping the Law, but rather the Law is a simplistic description of His righteousness, not its source.

But now apart from the law, a righteousness of God has been revealed, being testified by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ to all and on all those who believe. For there is no distinction, for all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God; being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus; whom God set forth to be an atoning sacrifice, through faith in his blood, for a demonstration of his righteousness through the passing over of prior sins, in God's forbearance; to demonstrate his righteousness at this present time; that he might himself be just, and the justifier of him who has faith in Jesus. (Romans 3:21-26)

Here we have been brought back full circle to where we began here in the first angel's message about God's judgment. Paul is talking about this righteousness of God completely separate from law as its source, because the main thrust of this whole chapter is about God being exonerated when He Himself is judged. Upon intense scrutiny He does not resist or resent, He will at last be exposed by the light of investigative truth as being just, right, true, faithful, reliable, trustworthy – everything sung about in the praise songs throughout this book that all resonate with the New Song paradigm.

For what if some were without faith? Will their lack of faith nullify the faithfulness of God? May it never be! Yes, let God be found true, but every man a liar. As it is written, "That you might be justified in your words, and might prevail when you come into judgment." (Romans 3:3-4)

With God there is no corruption, no hidden agenda, no selfishness but only selfless, passionate love that longs for each of us to thrive in that love for our own benefit and to participate in the great dance of joy for which everyone in the universe is created. Love has unlimited power, and the principles that may be observed in science, physics and the laws of nature all reflect parallel principles in the spirit realm. Electrical power is a prime example of the nature of God's love.

Electricity can be delivered safely over long distances by use of high power transmission lines so long as the principles of physics are respected. This is possible by keeping resistance to electrical energy to a minimum in the wires while at the same time using protective resisters to keep it isolated along the way. Having an intelligent awareness of the extreme dangers of high voltage power is extremely important, for if a person gets too close even to the presence of high voltage electrical energy, the potential for extreme harm or even instant death increases exponentially.

The problem involved when working around electrical components is not due to inherent dark motives on the part of electricity itself, but rather the inherent dangers of resistance. There is a key principle involved here which is that when the flow of electrical power is resisted, the result is heat, and when the ratio of power to resistance reaches a certain level the inevitable result is the breakdown and destruction of whatever is resisting. Thus when a person touches a live wire with electrical energy potential present in it, they can experience anywhere from a tingling jolt to a complete frying of their body, dependent on the level of amperage involved. In the case of very high voltage, even coming into close proximity to such equipment can result in power arcing out and destroying the person's life.¹

The point here is that the love of God is extremely high voltage power designed to provide the energy for activity and life everywhere in the universe. God is the Origin of all power, yet at the same time God is love. They are not different or contradictory ideas, but different aspects of the same thing. Everything in creation has been designed to have a unique and distinct part to play in God's great circuit of love, and so long as they remain in harmony with the principles that govern life and reality as God designed it – receiving freely to give freely – more than merely surviving they will prosper and thrive and experience deepest satisfaction and find highest fulfillment in all they were designed to experience.

So long as we remain in proper alignment in the circuit of love continually supplied from the throne of God, the byproduct at each juncture in this circuit of beneficence is wonder, praise, gratitude, thanksgiving and ever-increasing appreciation for the life and love and heart of the One who designed and sustains all of this. The power we receive is always sufficient and is full of grace and truth. Blessings are freely received, enjoyed and amplified as we remain synchronized with the principles God created that collectively govern all creation as one composite reflection of the very principle of love itself originating in the Godhead.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him. Without him was not anything made that has been made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men.

The Word became flesh, and lived among us. We saw his glory, such glory as of the one and only Son of the Father, full of grace and truth.

From his fullness we all received grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses. Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. (John 1:1-4,14,16-17)

Continuing with the electrical analogy, this passage indicates that the Son of God, the one and only true Word of God's power, assumed human form for the purpose of both revealing and infusing the power of God safely back into humanity that has been so deranged by Satan's lies that we face mortal danger from exposure to the very power designed to make us thrive. This confusion has caused us to view God with suspicion and to resist His love for us. Yet our very distrust and unbelief is our greatest liability and is what Jesus came to remedy.

By taking on the form of fallen humanity, the Son of God in essence covered Himself with sufficient insulation to protect us from over exposure to levels of God's glory that could be lethal for us in our state of deep distrust of God. Thus Jesus reconnects us in His humanity linked with divinity, establishing a lifeline through which unlimited healing power can flow to this world for the purpose of distributing truth and grace that can save us from our sins. This is why there is no other way to be reconnected to God other than through Jesus Christ, because Jesus Christ is the only safe transmission line by which we can be reconnected back into the circuit of power safely.

Be it known to you all, and to all the people of Israel, that in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead, in him does this man stand here before you whole. He is 'the stone which was regarded as worthless by you, the builders, which has become the head of the corner.' There is salvation in none other, for neither is there any other name under heaven, that is given among men, by which we must be saved!" (Acts 4:10-12)

Jesus said to him, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father, except through me." (John 14:6)

In His veiled form of humanity, Jesus becomes the power distribution cable reconnecting heaven and earth to bring life, hope and joy into every heart willing to be synchronized once again with the heart of the Father before it is too late, before sin so hardens our internal emotional circuits that we have no capacity to repent.

Having therefore, brothers, boldness to enter into the holy place by the blood of Jesus, by the way which he dedicated for us, a new and living way, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh; and having a great priest over the house of God, let's draw near with a true heart in fullness of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and having our body washed with pure water, let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering; for he who promised is faithful. Let us consider how to provoke one another [affirmation, affection, New Song lyrics and music] to love and good works, not forsaking our own assembling together, as the custom of some is, but exhorting one another [reminders of true identity]; and so much the more, as you see the Day approaching. For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, [the truth of God's unaffected love, of our true identity as His reflectors] there remains no more a sacrifice for sins, [the remedy of truth about God and sin loses is active ingredient] but a certain fearful expectation of judgment, and a fierceness of fire [the alternative view of God's power that is rooted in earthly lies resulting in a dead short] which will devour the adversaries. [viewing God through an adversarial mindset rather than a loving Father perspective, leaving us to misinterpret God's passionate love as anger, resulting in torment whenever we encounter the presence of love, denying the truth that could have set us free] (Hebrews 10:19-27)

Confusion about judgment has darkened people's perceptions of God since the very beginning of sin. Rather than attempting to explain satisfactorily every story such as the death of Nadab and Abihu or Ananias and Sapphira, I believe it is more effective to first gain an understanding of the real truth about judgment the way God does it in order to dismantle and disarm our fears and prejudices that have caused us to distrust our loving Father's heart. When we allow Jesus Christ, the only reliable revelation of God's heart, to be our sole authority by which we test every other testimony, our hearts can discover light, life and truth that can set us free.

Judgment and Bribery

Judges and officers shall you make you in all your gates, which Yahweh your God gives you, according to your tribes; and they shall judge the people with righteous judgment. You shall not wrest justice: you shall not respect persons; neither shall you take a bribe; for a bribe does blind the eyes of the wise, and pervert the words of the righteous. That which is altogether just shall you follow, that you may live, and inherit the land which Yahweh your God gives you. (Deuteronomy 16:18-20)

This element of bribery is extremely important to take seriously. This is not merely about human judges resisting temptations to enrich themselves at the expense of the innocent, but it directly links to how we perceive how God relates to us, especially regarding our gifts to Him and even obedience. True righteousness is outside the influence of trading and commerce and cannot be manipulated.

How shall I come before Yahweh, and bow myself before the exalted God? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? Will Yahweh be pleased with thousands of rams? With tens of thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my disobedience? The fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He has shown you, O man, what is good. What does Yahweh require of you, but to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God? (Micah 6:6-8)

For millennia people have assumed that God is in the judging business and that He is little different than the pagan gods who demand gifts in exchange for blessings, protection or provision for our needs. People have brought sacrifices to God all throughout history expecting they could alter His thinking or feelings in one way or another. Gifts and sacrifices were offered to gain forgiveness or to keep Him from being upset or whatever it was they imagined He wanted in order to gain what they wanted. Yet when it is distilled down to its core, such thinking is simply bribery, but this is not the relationship God wants with His children. That kind of thinking is rooted in imagining that God is most interested in people keeping His rules, regulations and demands, and that love and favor are only rewards for pleasing Him sufficiently. With this perception of God, it is easy to see why people balk at the idea that God is not in the judging business as we do judging. He is seeking a mutual friendship of love based on trust and with full respect for the freedom for everyone.

Judgment and Vengeance

Therefore don't you pray for this people, neither lift up cry nor prayer for them; for I will not hear them in the time that they cry to me because of their trouble. What has my beloved to do in my house, seeing she has worked lewdness with many, and the holy flesh is passed from you? when you do evil, then you rejoice.

Yahweh called your name, A green olive tree, beautiful with goodly fruit: [this has to do with who is the source of our identity] with the noise of a great tumult he has kindled fire on it, and the branches of it are broken. For Yahweh of Armies, who planted you, has pronounced evil against you, because of the evil of the house of Israel and of the house of Judah, which they have worked for themselves in provoking me to anger by offering incense to Baal. Yahweh gave me knowledge of it, and I knew it: then you shown me their doings. [Note the real cause of the evil to come on them – a result of their own resistance to living in His love and turning instead to their own ways.]

But I was like a gentle lamb that is led to the slaughter; [violently slaughtered Lamb of Revelation 5] and I didn't know that they had devised devices against me, saying, Let us destroy the tree with the fruit of it, [Tree of Life?] and let us cut him off from the land of the living, that his name may be no more remembered. But, Yahweh of Armies, who judges righteously, who tests the heart and the mind, I shall see your vengeance on them; for to you have I revealed my cause. (Jeremiah 11:14-20)

Vengeance is closely linked with our ideas of justice and judging. It is also linked with our notions of fairness which are rooted in the scales version of justice. Thus judgment, vengeance and payback involve what we imagine must happen for justice to be served. In Satan's system, paying back evil for evil and good for good is how life is kept in balance. Yet this is what paganism has taught all along, and it originated with Satan, not God. The typical view of scales that represent justice involves two hanging bowls attached to a cross-beam by which to measure the relative moral weight between good and evil. It occurred to me that these bowls are misappropriated censers disconnected from their original purpose and meaning, that of carrying incense along with prayers and praises of God's people.

God's vengeance is to be left up to Him, not because He has more power than us to effectively inflict punishment on those we think deserve it, but because our kind of payback is always tainted with selfishness and twisted desires, the very core of Satan's kingdom of good and evil. God's judgment and vengeance operate completely outside that venue.

Don't seek revenge yourselves, beloved, but give place to God's wrath. For it is written, "Vengeance belongs to me; I will repay, says the Lord." Therefore "If your enemy is hungry, feed him. If he is thirsty, give him a drink; for in doing so, you will heap coals of fire on his head." Don't be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. (Romans 12:19-21)

Notice particularly a reference included here defining how God does vengeance – heap coals of fire. What this is alerting us to is that we are to withdraw entirely from the mindset and agenda of the scales version of justice which is like recovering the censers from their hijacked use as measuring devices for the scales, to restore them to their original purpose – to sweeten the atmosphere with coals of burning incense emanating from the lives of those aligned with God's disposition towards His enemies.

You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor, and hate your enemy.' [That's how the 'justice' scales operate – returning like treatment after its own kind] But I tell you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who mistreat you and persecute you, that you may be children of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Don't even the tax collectors do the same? If you only greet your friends, what more do you do than others? Don't even the tax collectors do the same? Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect. (Matthew 5:43-48)

The fatal fault in the design of the scales of justice, is that if the scales are allowed to swing too far out of balance they can come into danger of malfunctioning and could potentially be pushed a place where they would self-destruct through loss of credibility. That is one thing God sent Jesus to accomplish – to demolish and replace our justice scales mentality that dictates how we relate to each other and to Him. Jesus came under the Law that had been misappropriated to reinforce a wrong perception of justice, and then He pushed the scales so beyond their capacity of credible function that they were permanently damaged and would eventually collapse under the enormous weight of condemnation. Because the scales are designed to be kept close to center balance by returning evil for evil and rewarding good with good, when pushed entirely outside all resemblance to achieving that asserted purpose would expose that whole way of thinking as very immature at best and intolerable in the long term.

By allowing unlimited injustice to be heaped on Him in the form of undeserved punishment, despite clear and stated conclusions on the part of both Herod and Pilate that no cause could be discovered as an excuse to punish Him for anything, the scales became so severely over-stressed by the trial and condemnation heaped on Christ that when He died, even nature cried out in protest as the universe reacted with revulsion while those who participated in this travesty of justice suddenly realized what they had just done was a crime beyond the pall deserving of death according to their own system. The executioners purporting to defend justice had rather incriminated themselves as criminals in this case, and the whole system of justice was exposed for the fraud that it actually is all the way to its roots.

Judgment with Partiality

Therefore you are without excuse, O man, whoever you are who judge. For in that which you judge another, you condemn yourself. For you who judge practice the same things. We know that the judgment of God is according to truth against those who practice such things. Do you think this, O man who judges those who practice such things, and do the same, that you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you despise the riches of his goodness, forbearance, and patience, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance? But according to your hardness and unrepentant heart you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath, revelation, and of the righteous judgment of God; who "will pay back to everyone according to their works:" (Romans 2:1-6)

Here we find Paul speaking about judgment that involves both our judging of others as well as God's judgment. On the surface it would appear that he contradicts that God is being judged by others, yet upon closer examination we see that the core of the problem is our judging of God, both directly and indirectly in how we judge others created in the image of God.

But nobody can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With it we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who are made in the image of God. Out of the same mouth comes forth blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things ought not to be so. (James 3:8-10)

My brothers, don't hold the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ of glory with partiality. For if a man with a gold ring, in fine clothing, comes into your synagogue, and a poor man in filthy clothing also comes in; and you pay special attention to him who wears the fine clothing, and say, "Sit here in a good place;" and you tell the poor man, "Stand there," or "Sit by my footstool;" haven't you shown partiality among yourselves, and become judges with evil thoughts? [The essence of partiality]

However, if you fulfill the royal law, according to the Scripture, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself," you do well. But if you show partiality, you commit sin, being convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever keeps the whole law, and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all. For he who said, "Do not commit adultery," also said, "Do not commit murder." Now if you do not commit adultery, but murder, you have become a transgressor of the law. So speak, and so do, as men who are to be judged by a law of freedom. For judgment is without mercy to him who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment. (James 2:1-4, 8-13)

These last sentences explain what is meant by God judging or paying back to everyone according to their works. This is not about God imposing proportional punishment based on unforgiven offenses people have committed. Rather this explains the principle of cause and effect that is inevitable when we do not honor the principles of mercy, kindness, forgiveness and unconditional love in the way we view others. When we judge others with partiality determined by self interest rather than viewing them as equals with us in God's sight, we reject the venue of God's mercy and hand over our authority to Satan who oversees the system of proportional payback for both good and evil.

When we persist in judging others and assigning their identity based on the relative value system of this world, we withdraw our authority from God by handing it over to His enemy. In so doing, we betray our freedom to choose by giving Satan access to enslave us and harden our heart until our very capacity to respond to mercy is extinguished. When this tragic condition is reached, God is compelled to hand us over to the merciless justice we have chosen as reflective of what we think God is like, so He releases us to be judged by that system that replaces His merciful kindness.

'Shouldn't you also have had mercy on your fellow servant, even as I had mercy on you?' His lord was angry, and delivered him to the tormentors, until he should pay all that was due to him. So my heavenly Father will also do to you, if you don't each forgive your brother from your hearts for his misdeeds. (Matthew 18:33-35)

We are bound to always give thanks to God for you, brothers, even as it is appropriate, because your faith grows exceedingly, and the love of each and every one of you towards one another abounds; so that we ourselves boast about you in the assemblies of God for your patience and faith in all your persecutions and in the afflictions which you endure. This is an obvious sign of the righteous judgment of God, to the end that you may be counted worthy of the Kingdom of God, for which you also suffer.

Since it is a righteous thing with God to repay affliction to those who afflict you, and to give relief to you who are afflicted with us, when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, giving vengeance to those who don't know God, and to those who don't obey the Good News of our Lord Jesus, who will pay the penalty: eternal destruction from the face of the Lord and from the glory of his might, when he comes to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired among all those who have believed (because our testimony to you was believed) in that day. (2 Thessalonians 1:3-10)

How does God repay affliction to those who afflict? The answer is in the previous passage from Matthew 18 He releases them to reap what they have sown. They are handed over to the tormentors who enforce the law of the scales, so they are compelled to feel torment for the torment they have inflicted on others, only this is not because God initiates it but because torment comes from within and is inescapable without surrendering to live under the law of life. The penalty described here – destruction from the face of the Lord and His glory, is a natural reaction that the lost experience because of their allergies to the ways of love, truth and freedom. Their false paradigms and the very basis of the identity they have embraced as reality is destroyed in the light of truth that exposes them as unsubstantial, like a hologram is exposed as having no real substance. Passages like this must always be interpreted in light of the truth as revealed about God through the words of Jesus, for it is those words alone by which all will be judged, including God Himself.

For to this you were called, because Christ also suffered for us, leaving you an example, that you should follow his steps, who did not sin, "neither was deceit found in his mouth." Who, when he was cursed, didn't curse back. When he suffered, didn't threaten, but committed himself to him who judges righteously; who his own self bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live to righteousness; by whose stripes you were healed. For you were going astray like sheep; but now have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls. (1 Peter 2:21-25)

Jesus refused to participate in the slightest in the design of the scales predicated on balancing good and evil with good and evil. In this way He crashed the scales² and destroyed their credibility forever.

Personally I have come to see judgment and the inherent dangers surrounding it, to be an issue of respecting the principles of life and harmony with those principles in order to experience blessing rather than experiencing curses. We understand in the physical realm the importance of shielding wires that carry electricity in order to prevent harm from power going where it is not designed to go. This is a useful analogy to apply to the enormous power of God's love, for principles observed in the physical realm are reflective of parallel principles in the spiritual. When we learn how these principles function and how we may relate to power according to God's will and design, we can avoid tragic mistakes of people who have ignored them in the past that opened the way for the enemy to exploit their rejection of God's will for them.

I saw the heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and he who sat on it is called Faithful and True. In righteousness he judges and makes war. (Revelation 19:11)

Proportional Judgment

Righteous judgment is what happens when the light of truth and love exposes how one reacts to the current power love from heaven that is only intended for good. God is only light with no darkness at all in Him (1 John 1:5). How we choose to relate to this light is what Jesus defines as judgment, for judgment is simply a diagnosis, not a sentence imposed or forced on anyone. It is in how we react to love and truth that exposes the inner condition of our heart and motives, revealing the character we have been forming in how we have chosen to relate to the love already freely given to us. Judgment simply exposes how much resistance to love has been retained in the heart.

What are presumed to be punishments inflicted by God are actually descriptions of the natural results of dissonance in the heart when exposed to the presence of God's passion (the word wrath literally means passion). The intensity of torment experienced in such encounters is directly proportional to the level of resistance to love and truth one has refused to let go. This is often described as payback or judging according to our deeds, yet it really describes a natural principle that is a reaction of resistance when encountering power and can result in excessive damaging heat. When we read the phrase 'according to,' we can understand it as describing the principle of proportional cause and effect.

Yahweh has rewarded me according to my righteousness. According to the cleanness of my hands has he recompensed me. For I have kept the ways of Yahweh, and have not wickedly departed from my God. For all his ordinances were before me. I didn't put away his statutes from me. I was also blameless with him. I kept myself from my iniquity [twisted thinking]. Therefore Yahweh has rewarded me according to my righteousness, according to the cleanness of my hands in his eyesight. With the merciful you will show yourself merciful. With the perfect man, you will show yourself perfect. With the pure, you will show yourself pure. With the crooked you will show yourself shrewd. For you will save the afflicted people, but the haughty eyes you will bring down. For you will light my lamp, Yahweh. My God will light up my darkness. (Psalms 18:20-28)

Resistance reacts to exposure to agape love and is evidenced by fear, anger, bitterness or other strong negative emotions. Freedom from resistance is our most urgent need and is part of the healing process needed to prepare us to come into judgment without fear but with boldness. As we allow the Spirit to live in us and bring us into living in freedom, the results of exposure to the light of God's love that causes judgment, will on that final day of judgment produce reactions of joy, hope, peace and intense bonding with the heart of God. Thus everything pivots around our willingness to cooperate with the Spirit's work in us to synchronize us with the heart of God's agape love so judgment becomes healing and life-giving rather than a terror and dread.

Therefore, by their fruits you will know them. Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter into the Kingdom of Heaven; but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will tell me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, didn't we prophesy in your name, in your name cast out demons, and in your name do many mighty works?' Then I will tell them, 'I never knew you. Depart from me, you who work iniquity.' (Matthew 7:20-23)

This is a startling revelation by Jesus of the true nature of judgment. When we do things in the name of God, we are giving public notice that we claim God's authority and we re-present Him to others. Yet when we fail to reflect His disposition and rely on His methods alone, God's authority in our lives is disallowed. Because of those who claim to represent Him, yet who remain resistant to abiding in His love, it becomes necessary necessary to investigate both God as well as those claiming to represent Him in order that the real truth may be brought to light as to the validity of our testimony, our reflection of what we believe about God. Thus all come into judgment including God.

Symptoms of sin must be understood in light of the principles of love which is described simplistically by the Law of God. His law is not like the artificial laws we are used to, but are natural and self-enforcing. Where there is resistance to love and truth, dissonance results from the improper alignment of our spirit in our relation to love. What we usually think of as sins are actually symptoms called deeds of darkness. This darkness is caused by the absence of the light of truth and reveals that we are dangerously low on love, the fuel for which we are designed. When we resist the truth of God's love, a vacuum of darkness is created in the spirit resulting in symptoms we call sin. Sin at its core is resistance to the principle of freely receiving love to freely give love to others. Determined, persistent resistance over time produces increasing reservoirs of potential friction. When judgment happens, the more resistance to love that is uncovered, the more discomfort is experienced until it eventually culminates in the choice to demand death rather than continue living in the torment that resistance to love produces in the hardened heart.

...and with all deception of wickedness for those who are being lost, because they didn't receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. (2 Thessalonians 2:10)

God is love. He is light with no hint of darkness at all. The God who created all things is the three-part Source from which all power, love, truth, light and goodness originate. There is no corruption with God, no fear, no deceit, no shame or condemnation or limit to love. Obviously there is no resistance to love in God, but continuous, other-centered passionate love that circulates between the three members of the Godhead and flows out to all. This love has circulated from eternity past and will always flow throughout eternity future. God has no problem being judged, for They have nothing to hide (except to veil the intensity of Their love to protect those not ready to handle such intensity). God welcomes being judged, as truth never fears investigation. This is righteous judgment, for only error and darkness fear being exposed. There is no darkness in God but only love. God is not fearful of being judged, for as He is investigated and exposed, the truth of His passionate, selfless love will establish the validity of what He has been saying about Himself all along. At the same time, this judgment exposes by contrast all the lies, slander and misapprehensions circulating about Him and will be discredited, brought to nothing in the process of Him being judged. Thus the hour of His judgment means the time has come for a full and comprehensive investigation of God to be fully concluded so all confusion and chaos caused by sin may be forever eliminated.

This angel messenger invites us to judge God. This is no threat to God but is essential for the exoneration and justification of His reputation in order for the full elimination of evil be accomplished for all eternity. This angel shouts loudly to get our attention that it is time for each of us to judge God, to investigate all the evidence that has accumulated throughout history, to expose the real truth about Him so we may experience for ourselves this saving truth revealed through His Son. This will never upset God but does just the opposite. God is delighted by our probing, penetrating, challenging questions to uncover the real truth about Him, for He knows that if we truly know Him, and exert all our mental and emotional energies to unmask what is really true about what is inside Him, what we discover will be the Origin of our own identity.

But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his works may be revealed, that they have been done in God. (John 3:21)

This is what it means to do the truth when it comes to judgment, for to investigate and judge the character and motives and actions of the Judge whose reputation has been under such great suspicion, is what it means come to the light. When one chooses to come into the light it involves being willing to come out from under the spell of darkness. The light of truth exposes, but it also is healing and life-giving. As we choose to come into the light of love in our investigation of God in order to judge Him, the light exposes our own condition in relation to Him. Yet instead of feeling condemned by Him as we might expect, the closer we come to that Heart from which all love emanates, the more we discover the amazing truth that we have been loved by Him and have been living in Him all along. To our amazement we discover that everything we do, think, act out and even our very existence has been completely dependent on His graciousness, kindness, compassion and sustaining power of love that has been sustaining us inside of Him all along.

We know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and he who remains in love remains in God, and God remains in him. In this love has been made perfect among us, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment, because as he is, even so are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear has punishment. He who fears is not made perfect in love. We love Him, because he first loved us. (1 John 4:16-19)

Addendum

While God is the main focus of this judgment process, and His reflectors on earth are caught up in this judgment/exposing investigation, we must not ignore the important reality that for evil to be entirely annulled and stripped of all is alluring power, the author of evil himself must be fully exposed and all the fruit of his distortions about truth must be judged by the glory of the light of truth.

God presides in the great assembly. He judges among the gods. [This next portion may be addressed primarily to the fallen Lucifer who originated the counterfeit judgment system that operates with a merciless justice.] "How long will you judge unjustly, and show partiality to the wicked?" Selah. "Defend the weak, the poor, and the fatherless. Maintain the rights of the poor and oppressed. Rescue the weak and needy. Deliver them out of the hand of the wicked." [How did Satan use the authority granted by God in the story of Job?] They don't know, neither do they understand. They walk back and forth in darkness. [A clear reference to Satan's claim in Job 1 and 2 that all the earth was loyal to his principles of selfishness and system defined in commerce.] All the foundations of the earth are shaken. I said, "You are gods, all of you are sons of the Most High. [We are gods because we are created to reflect God as His children, to be like Him. But the counterfeit distorts this by claiming God is both good and evil and harks back to Lucifer's ambition to be like the Most High and eclipse Him.] Nevertheless you shall die like men [linked to God's words addressing Lucifer in both Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28], and fall like one of the rulers." Arise, God, judge the earth, for you inherit all of the nations. [Inheritance operates by family identity, not coercive control.] (Psalms 82:1-8)

This phrase, judges among the gods, I find relevant to the words of God shortly after the fall of our first Adam. It helps me to differentiate the lie of the serpent that God knows both good and evil, with the words of God after the fall giving the reason for the need to expel Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden.

Yahweh God said, "Behold, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil. Now, lest he put forth his hand, and also take of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever..." Therefore Yahweh God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken. So he drove out the man; and he placed Cherubs at the east of the garden of Eden, and the flame of a sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life. (Genesis 3:22-24)

In my opinion in this context, I believe God's reference to 'us' as gods encompasses Lucifer's claim to be god, or in other words, the whole struggle in the supernatural realm of gods as to who should be trusted as portraying the truth about God among the contenders vying over what others will believe.

Even if our Good News is veiled, it is veiled in those who perish; in whom the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, that the light of the Good News of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should not dawn on them. For we don't preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake; seeing it is God who said, "Light will shine out of darkness," who has shone in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. (2 Corinthians 4:3-6)

You were made alive when you were dead in transgressions and sins, in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the powers of the air, the spirit who now works in the children of disobedience; among whom we also all once lived in the lust of our flesh, doing the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, being rich in mercy, for his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with him, and made us to sit with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus; for by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, that no one would boast. (Ephesians 2:1-9)

Now is the judgment of this world. Now the prince of this world will be cast out. And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself." (John 12:31-32)

When he has come, he will convict the world about sin, about righteousness, and about judgment; about sin, because they don't believe in me; about righteousness, because I am going to my Father, and you won't see me any more; about judgment, because the prince of this world has been judged. (John 16:8-11)

For though we walk in the flesh, we don't wage war according to the flesh; for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but mighty before God to the throwing down of strongholds, throwing down imaginations and every high thing that is exalted against the knowledge of God, and bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ; (2 Corinthians 10:3-5)

I saw an angel coming down out of heaven, having the key of the abyss and a great chain in his hand. He seized the dragon, the old serpent, which is the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole inhabited earth, and bound him for a thousand years, and cast him into the abyss, and shut it, and sealed it over him, that he should deceive the nations no more, until the thousand years were finished. After this, he must be freed for a short time. (Revelation 20:1-3)

The devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet are also. They will be tormented day and night forever and ever. (Revelation 20:10)

1While resistance to electrical power can be deadly, it is also necessary to contain and direct the transmission of that power when used in the right ways. Insulators protect the flow of electrical power over transmission lines by isolating it from escaping the wires in the wrong ways, preventing shorts and grounding so that the power is delivered to the intended location safely. Thus resistance when used correctly is a blessing, while resistance in the transmission lines themselves can be destructive. This calls for wisdom and awareness of the principles that govern how power operates.

2Some will insist that the reference to balance scales in Daniel 5 used to judge the wicked king proves that God relies on the scales system and supports it as legitimate. But this simplistic approach fails to take into account the rest of Scripture and minimizes the superior authority of the teachings of Christ as the greater light. The answer to this lies in an appreciation of how God is forced to release those who cross the line of total rejection of His mercy, to come under the tyrannical authority of merciless judgment enforced by the originator of the scales. It is not God listed as the one assessing the king as failing the balance test, but simply the announcement that the determination had transpired, meaning that the king had given his authority to Satan to be judged according to his measuring scales judging system.