Dear Fellow Believers,
It is a natural instinct of humanity to want to see justice served. Yet we of the body of Christ have been so smitten by grace that we would let any and all offenders against truth "off the hook." Yet this is not "grace," but "nice." Many confuse grace with nice, and therefore inadvertently erase the righteous judgements of God, and even the vengeance of God, which always and eonially
works toward the rehabilitation of the vengeancee, and, in fact, is quite indispensable toward that end.
Where we, the grace people, would say, "away with judgment and vengeance," God would say, "Ah, but grace does not eliminate these for the sake of unbelievers, for by these tools the unbelievers at last realize the debilitating effects of self-righteousness and are feed to at last bask in the favor and goodness of God." The inhibiting factor ( self-righteousness) is done away by trial.
For us it is done away by realization and faith, for others, God chooses another route: vengeance. Both methods work to equal result. (I prefer the former.)
This is God demonstrating his multifarious wisdom and ways on vessels both of honor and of the opposite variety.
How surprising to see Paul himself, at the end of his career, wishing the vengeance of God upon a man who had withstood his ministry and worked many evils against him and his coworkers. Grace allows for this, for the end RESULT is gracious.
The "untaught passage of Paul," comes from 2 Thessalonians chapter 1, and it speaks of "eonian extermination" and the "vengeance" and "afflictions" of God, Who repays affliction to those who have afflicted us. Where we would say, "No, let them off the hook," God says, "Vengeance is Mine, not yours— bring on the hooks."
Like Joseph's brothers, whom Joseph tormented with many trials prior to unveiling himself to them and blessing their sandals off, those who have afflicted us must taste their own evil—be hung upon their own gallows, as it were—so as to understand that, all along, they have sought to demean and destroy the wrong people. To these God will say, "You would bring pain and reviling to a son of
God? It will not stand. Not even grace lets it stand, for in the end the vengeance awakens and then changes you, the mindless perpetrators."
This message was recorded in June of 2005 at the Willard, Ohio, conference. Thanks again to Rodney Paris who has brought it out of the mothballs and given it new life.
Grace, peace and love to you from the Floridan peninsula,
Martin
